Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned there will be \u201cproblems\u201d with neighboring Finland after it joined the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) earlier this year. <\/p>\n
Finland\u2019s ascension to NATO marked a major shift in the security landscape in northern Europe, and added some 1,300 kilometers (830 miles)\u00a0to the alliance\u2019s frontier with Russia. <\/p>\n
It was also a blow for President Putin, who has long warned against NATO expansion. <\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u00a0(the West)\u00a0took Finland and dragged it into NATO! Why, did we have any disputes with Finland? All disputes, including those of a territorial nature in the middle of the 20th Century, have all been resolved long ago,\u201d Putin said in an interview published on Sunday. <\/p>\n
\u201cThere were no problems, but now there will be, because we will now create the Leningrad military district there and definitely concentrate military units there,\u201d Putin\u00a0added\u00a0in the interview by Russian state broadcaster Russia 1. <\/p>\n
Putin also dismissed as \u201ccomplete nonsense\u201d remarks from US President Joe Biden, who earlier this month warned that Putin would \u201ckeep going\u201d if he takes Ukraine, suggesting that Russia could eventually attack a NATO ally and draw US troops into conflict. <\/p>\n
The Russian leader said Russia\u00a0\u201chas no reason, no interest, no geopolitical interest, neither economic, nor political, nor military, to fight with NATO countries,\u201d adding Moscow does not have any territorial claims in NATO countries. <\/p>\n
\u201cThere is no desire to spoil relations with them (NATO countries), we are interested in developing relations,\u201d Putin added. <\/p>\n
Finland became the 31st member of NATO when it joined in April, doubling the security alliance\u2019s direct frontier with Russia. <\/p>\n
Even before Putin launched his invasion of Ukraine, he had demanded NATO limit its expansion. Yet, it was the war that \u201caltered the security environment of Finland,\u201d driving the Nordic nation\u2019s desire to join the alliance, President Sauli Niinist\u00f6 said in May 2022 when announcing his country would seek to join. <\/p>\n
Within a few months of its application, the Finnish government said it would spend around $143 million on building barrier fences along Finland\u2019s 830-mile eastern border with Russia, which used to have little security protections. <\/p>\n
Finland again shut its entire border with Russia this week, over claims hundreds of people were trying to cross without a visa. <\/p>\n
After another closure was announced last month, Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo accused Russia of \u201cenabling the instrumentalization of people and guiding them to the Finnish border in harsh winter conditions.\u00a0Finland\u00a0is determined to put an end to this phenomenon.\u201d <\/p>\n\n
Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned there will be \u201cproblems\u201d with neighboring Finland after it joined the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) earlier this year. Finland\u2019s ascension to NATO marked a major shift in the security landscape in northern Europe, and added some 1,300 kilometers (830 miles)\u00a0to the alliance\u2019s frontier with Russia. It was also <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":12983,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-12982","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12982","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12982"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12982\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12983"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12982"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12982"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12982"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}