Finnish President Sauli Niinisto is expected on Thursday to say whether his country should join the NATO alliance, with Sweden following suit with its decision in the coming days.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine has pushed Finland and Sweden to the verge of applying for NATO membership and abandoning a belief held for decades that peace was best kept by not publicly choosing sides.
Both countries are close NATO partners, having taken part in allied exercises for years. Any accession process is expected to be much shorter than previous applications to join the alliance since the 1950s. NATO was founded in 1949.
While many other aspirants, such as Ukraine and Georgia, have been asked to carry out reforms before a membership request can be accepted, Finland and Sweden are considered successful democracies with militaries that meet NATO standards.This is likely to happen in Brussels at NATO headquarters, taking as little as one day for each country, which agree to respect the terms of NATO's founding Washington Treaty.
Known informally as NATO's "marriage vows", officials from Helsinki and Stockholm answer questions on whether they would uphold NATO's collective defence pledge that an attack on one ally is an attack on all. They would also have to agree to pay their share of NATO budgets, take part in NATO defence planning and promise to respect rules on classified information.The 30 allies would likely grant Finland and Sweden membership of NATO, giving them observer status at all allied meetings. However, they would still not be covered by NATO's collective defence guarantee.All allied parliaments must ratify a membership approval by national governments.
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