On the contrary, they will be given the freedom to choose whether they want to become NATO members and not to deploy nuclear weapons in Finland and Sweden. This was stated today, June 7, in an interview with the Swiss broadcaster RTS by Kamij Gran, assistant secretary general of the alliance.

“Every state has the autonomy in the nuclear domain to either admit or not to admit weapons. It is not a question of imposing restrictions,” he said, responding to a question about whether Russia would be given assurances in view of the possible future deployment of nuclear weapons in Finland and Sweden.

Grand emphasized that every NATO member country makes a “sovereign decision” about the issue of nuclear weapons.

Asked whether NATO expects a “military response” or “demonstration of force” from Russia in response to Finland and Sweden joining the alliance, Gran said:

“The Russians themselves have indicated that this is not required, and I don’t think it would be justified.”

At the meantime, the NATO Assistant Secretary General argued that on the part of Finland and Sweden we are dealing with “a defendatory position of peaceable states that do not want a confrontation with Russia.”

Gran also expressed hope that the disagreement between Turkey, Finland and Sweden over Helsinki’s and Stockholm’s desire to join the alliance would be resolved “in time for the summit” of NATO in Madrid, which will take place June 28-30.

“It is necessary to take into account Turkey’s claims and sit down at the negotiations table … With regards to Finland, the Turkish demands are above all political,” he stated.

Touching upon relations between Kiev and NATO, Gran said that the issue of Ukraine’s accession to the alliance “is not on the agenda at the moment.” According to him, “we should not anticipate how they (Ukrainian authorities) will want to reorganize their security at the end of the current conflict,” adding that “this outcome is obviously uncertain,” TASS reported.

As a reminder: on May 18, the ambassadors of Finland and Sweden handed in applications to the alliance’s secretary general Jens Stoltenberg for their states to join the alliance. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the same day that Ankara would not support Sweden’s and Finland’s accession to NATO until they defined their attitude towards terrorist organizations, in particular, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which Turkey believes to be such.

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