According to Seven Sakkov, the Estonian ambassador, Finland will submit its application sometime before the NATO summit, which will take place in Madrid by the end of June. Sweden will follow suit, if not immediately but during the summit.
He said that “I believe that Sweden will follow later this. Thus they will also receive an invitation to join, if needed, at the Madrid summit, which will take place on June 29-30.”
The ambassador continued then it was likely that Finland would join NATO by the end of this year and that one can only hope that the process would take place as soon as possible.
Prime Minister Sana Marin had said that “we are prepared for all kinds of actions from Russia.”
She had said that the option to join NATO had to be carefully analyzed, but it changed when the Russian forces invaded Ukraine in February. She also added that: “the difference between being a partner and being a member is very clear and will remain so. There is no other way to have security guarantees than under NATO’s deterrence and common defense, which is guaranteed by NATO’s Article 5.”
While Russia has repeatedly warned both countries against joining NATO, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov has said that if Finland and Sweden entered NATO, Russia would have to “rebalance the situation” with its measures.
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