Former Russian President Dimitri Medvedev warned Thursday that if Finland and Sweden join NATO, Russia “will have more officially registered opponents”, while reflecting on the loss of the Baltic region’s non-nuclear status.
“If Sweden and Finland join NATO, the length of the Alliance’s land borders with Russia will more than double”, he considered, before insisting that, “naturally”, those borders will have to be “strengthened”.
Thus, it would be necessary to “restore the balance”, as it has affected its Telegram channel, where it has emphasized that Moscow had not strengthened those borders and “was not going to do so”, according to the Russian news agency Interfax. In his opinion, faced with this scenario, Russia must react “without emotion, with a cool head.”
On the other hand, the former president has expressed his “disagreement” with the opinion that if Russia had not started the invasion of Ukraine, the question of Finnish and Swedish accession to NATO would not have arisen. “Attempts have been made before to drag them into the Alliance,” he said.
Finland announced on Wednesday that the final decision of the Nordic country on its entry into NATO will be made “in weeks”. The Swedish press, meanwhile, revealed that Sweden’s intention is to announce its entry into the Alliance in June this year, coinciding with the Alliance summit in Madrid.
This would be the ideal scenario to formalize the application for membership, which, as Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has explained on several occasions, could be quick in view of the high level of alignment with NATO standards.