President Vladimir Putin on Monday said Russia has no grievances with Finland and Sweden, but that any attempt to expand military infrastructure on their territory would demand a reaction from Moscow, as the Nordic countries move closer to joining NATO.
At a summit of the Russian-led Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO) in Moscow, Putin maintained that NATO’s expansion was a problem for Russia and that it must look closely at what he said were the US-led military alliance’s plans to increase its global influence.
Speaking to the leaders of a Russian-dominated military alliance of former Soviet states, The Russian President said the enlargement of NATO was being used by the United States in an “aggressive” way in a bid to aggravate an already difficult global security situation.
One of Putin’s closest allies, former President Dmitry Medvedev, said last month that Russia could deploy nuclear weapons and hypersonic missiles in the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad if Finland and Sweden joined NATO.
NATO, founded in 1949 to provide European security against the Soviet Union, ultimately outguns Russia in almost every military measure apart from nuclear weapons, though the backbone of the alliance’s military power is the United States – whose forces are mostly deployed far from Europe.
Meanwhile, China on Monday, gave a vague response to Finland’s accession to Nato, saying the move will inject a “new factor” into the Chinese-Finnish relations.
At a regular press briefing, Deputy Director of the Foreign Ministry Information Department of China, Zhao Lijian, said “China has noticed Finland’s proposal to join the Nato. The sino-Finnish relationship has always been friendly. Finland’s application to join the Nato will of course add a new factor to the bilateral relations.”
Zhao did not elaborate what he meant by “new factor”, but when pushed by a Finnish journalist to say more, Zhao added that China has been “very clear on Nato and Nato’s eastward expansion.”
