NATO

Seventy-four years ago today—as the United States and 11 other nations came together to form the North Atlantic Treaty Organization—President Truman said, “if ...

Russia said it would boost its military presence in the region in response to Finland joining Nato. Read more at straitstimes.com.

Nato Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said: “Finland becomes safer by belonging to an alliance where we guarantee the security of all allies. “He wanted less Nato along his borders. He wanted to close Nato’s door. Finnish President Saul Niinisto said Finland’s most significant contribution to Nato’s common deterrence and defence would be to defend its own territory. “Sweden is ready to join the Nato alliance,” tweeted Mr Blinken. “The expansion of Nato is an assault on our security and Russia’s national interests,” he said. “All Nato members now need to take the steps necessary to admit Sweden too, so we can stand together as one alliance to defend freedom in Europe and across the world,” he said. British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on Tuesday hailed Finland’s “historic” accession to Nato and urged the military grouping to admit Sweden next. “President Putin had, as a declared goal of the invasion of Ukraine, to get less Nato,” Mr Stoltenberg said. “Our next goal is, of course, to get our good neighbour Sweden to the full membership as well,” he said. “It is a great day for Finland, and I want to say that it is an important day for Nato,” Mr Niinisto said at a joint news conference with Mr Stoltenberg. By becoming a full-fledged member, we are removing the room for miscalculation in Moscow about Nato’s readiness to protect Finland and that makes Finland safer and Nato stronger.”

FINLAND formally joined the Nato military alliance on Tuesday (Apr 4) in a historic policy shift brought on by Russia's invasion of Ukraine, ...

MOSCOW: Finland becomes the 31st member of NATO on Tuesday (Apr 4), in a historic shift that drew an angry warning of "countermeasures" from the Kremlin.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, he said, had "wanted to slam NATO's door shut. Advertisement

The Nordic nation's decision to join the defense alliance is seen as a blow to Russian President Vladimir Putin, but the Stimson Center's Emma Ashford ...

Finnish leaders obviously felt that it was better to be inside the alliance and reduce that sort of risk of this limbo period even if Sweden weren't there. They fought a war against Russia in the 1930s and into the 1940s for their own self-defense against the Soviet Union, and they kept that up through the Cold War." Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov separately told reporters that Finland's accession to NATO was forcing Moscow to take countermeasures to ensure its security. Finland raced to join NATO after Russia's invasion of Ukraine last year. After years of public opposition to joining NATO inside Finland, polling now shows Finns embrace the move. At the ceremony, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg announced, "For almost 75 years, this great alliance has shielded our nations and continues to do so today.

Perhaps most importantly, though, the country's accession cements the dramatic strategic shift that Russian President Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine ...

[peace deal](https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/4/3/un-experts-accuse-senior-south-sudan-officials-of-rights-abuses) was signed in 2018 after nearly 400,000 people died. [military relations](https://foreignpolicy.com/2023/02/02/us-philippines-military-bases-lloyd-austin-china-taiwan-war/) have grown in the last few months. On Monday, the [location](https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/04/asia/us-philippines-military-base-access-intl-hnk-ml/index.html) of those new bases was identified. And current Israeli Prime Minister [Benjamin Netanyahu](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/03/31/world-leaders-indicted-trump/) has been under indictment since 2019 on corruption charges. In the last 15 years alone, two French presidents, two South Korean presidents, and one Italian prime minister were found guilty of [corruption](https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/31/world/trump-world-leaders-indicted.html). And for the first time, a non-American is joining the A-team: Canadian Joseph Monytuil is among the top leaders said to be responsible for state-sanctioned killings in August 2022. 2, the two nations announced a deal increasing Washington’s access to military bases on the island from five to nine locations, an [expansion](https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/2/2/philippines-set-to-allow-wider-us-access-to-military-bases) of the 2014 Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement. But as Robbie Gramer reported for FP Insider, fresh after an evening with the Finnish Diplomatic Sauna Society, NATO headquarters just [installed](https://www.politico.eu/article/finland-sauna-culture-diplomacy-brussels/) its own steamy room. In the meantime, Finns and Western allies alike are celebrating adding Helsinki to the group. By adding Finland, the trans-Atlantic bloc doubles its border with Russia, expands the alliance’s F-35 stealth fighter program, and becomes home to one of the world’s three major 5G infrastructure providers. It’s a historic day for the world’s largest military alliance.

Finland's national flag was raised at NATO headquarters, a deeply symbolic moment and a stark display of the shifting global dynamics.