Finland formally joined Nato on Tuesday, its flag unfurling outside the military bloc\u2019s Brussels headquarters, in a historic policy shift brought on by Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine, drawing a threat from Moscow of \u201ccounter-measures\u201d.
\nFinland\u2019s accession roughly doubles the length of the border that Nato shares with Russia and bolsters its eastern flank as the war in Ukraine grinds on with no resolution in sight.
\nFinnish Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto completed the accession process by handing over an official document to US State Secretary Antony Blinken at Nato\u2019s HQ.
\nFinland\u2019s flag \u2014 a blue cross on a white background \u2014 was hoisted alongside those of the alliance\u2019s 30 other members as a military band played in bright sunshine.
\n\u201cFor almost 75 years, this great alliance has shielded our nations and continues to do so today,\u201d Nato Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg declared at the ceremony.
\n\u201cBut war has returned to Europe and Finland has decided to join Nato and be part of the world\u2019s most successful alliance.\u201d
\nStoltenberg earlier noted that Russian President Vladimir Putin had cited opposition to Nato\u2019s eastward enlargement as one justification for invading Ukraine.
\n\u201cHe is getting exactly the opposite [\u2026] Finland today, and soon also Sweden will become a full fledged member of the alliance,\u201d Stoltenberg said in Brussels.
\nFinnish President Saul Niinisto said Finland\u2019s most significant contribution to Nato\u2019s common deterrence and defence would be to defend its own territory. There is still significant work to be done to coordinate this with NATO, he said.
\n\u201cIt is a great day for Finland and I want to say that it is an important day for Nato,\u201d Niinisto said at a joint news conference with Stoltenberg.
\nThe Kremlin said Russia would be forced to take \u201ccounter-measures\u201d to Finland\u2019s accession. Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said the move raised the prospect of the conflict in Ukraine escalating further.
\nRussia had said on Monday it would strengthen its military capacity in its western and northwestern regions in response to Finland joining Nato.
\nThe Ukrainian government also hailed Finland\u2019s move. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy\u2019s chief of staff Andriy Yermak wrote on Telegram: \u201cFI made the right choice. Nato is also a key goal for Ukraine.\u201d
\nEnd to military non-alignment
\nThe event marks the end of an era of military non-alignment for Finland that began after the country repelled an invasion attempt by the Soviet Union during World War Two and opted to try to maintain friendly relations with neighbouring Russia.
\nBut the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 prompted Finns to seek security under Nato\u2019s collective defence pact, which states that an attack on one member is an attack on all.
\nMoscow, which long criticised the move, reacted crossly.
\nKremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the Nato expansion was an \u201cencroachment on our security and on Russia\u2019s national interests\u201d.
\nMoscow would watch closely for any Nato military deployments in Finland, he said.
\nSince the end of the Cold War three decades ago, Moscow has watched successive waves of Nato enlargement to the formerly communist east of Europe with consternation, and the issue was a bone of contention even before the invasion of Ukraine.
\nNato has repeatedly stressed that it is solely a defensive alliance and does not threaten Russia. Moscow says the funnelling of heavy weaponry to Ukraine by Nato countries since the war began proves the West is bent on destroying Russia.
\nFinland\u2019s accession brings Nato significant military capabilities developed over the years as it is one of the few European countries to have retained a conscription army through decades of peace, wary of Russia next door.
\nIn addition, Finland\u2019s ground, naval and air forces are all trained and equipped with one primary aim \u2014 to repel any Russian attack.
\nOn their way to work on Tuesday, Helsinki residents welcomed Finland\u2019s entry into Nato, saying they felt more secure.
\n\u201cI feel it\u2019s a good thing that Finland is joining Nato. We have been here next to Russia for ages,\u201d said Outi Lantimaki, 59, a designer at a shipyard.
\n\u201cMy father was in the war with the Russians so this is like a personal thing to me.\u201d
\nPeople in the Russian city of St Petersburg, only out 150km from the Finnish border, said Finland could be making problems for itself by joining Nato.
\n\u201cI don\u2019t think this is a very pleasant thing because we had good, neighbourly relations with Finland for quite a long time. It joining Nato isn\u2019t based on anything. But I hope reason will prevail and that there\u2019ll be no bad, military conflicts after this,\u201d said one resident who gave his name only as Alexi.
\nFinland and its Nordic neighbour Sweden applied together last year to join Nato, but the Swedish application has been held up by Nato members Turkey and Hungary.
\nSwedish Foreign Minister Tobias Billstroem told reporters it was Stockholm\u2019s ambition to become a member at the Nato summit in Vilnius in July.
\nTurkey says Stockholm harbours members of what Ankara considers terrorist groups \u2014 an accusation Sweden denies \u2014 and has demanded their extradition as a step toward ratifying Swedish membership.
\nHungary cites grievances over criticism of Prime Minister Viktor Orban\u2019s record on democracy and rule of law.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Finland formally joined Nato on Tuesday, its flag unfurling outside the military bloc\u2019s Brussels headquarters, in a historic policy shift brought on by Russia\u2019s invasion…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5798,"comment_status":"registered_only","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5797","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5797","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5797"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5797\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5798"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}