Finnish President Sauli Niinistö joined Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven as special guests at Warsaw's NATO Summit dinner on Friday night, the first time militarily non-aligned countries were granted access to the closed-door event.
Niinistö said Friday evening's supper conversation was largely about Russia and that dialogue with Russia is gradually replacing fear of the world's largest country.
Finnish President Sauli Niinistö joined Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven as special guests at the NATO Summit's dinner on Friday night, the first time militarily non-aligned countries were granted access to the event.
Niinistö presented a talk on reducing tension over the Baltic Sea and also met with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko about resolving the on-going crisis in Ukraine.
Niinistö said on Saturday that "what Russia has done in Ukraine was wrong and continues to be wrong," and a serious effort is still being made to reach a peaceful solution to the problem.
On the agenda
The meeting of NATO leaders in Warsaw agreed yesterday to deploy military forces to the Baltic states and eastern Poland for the first time. The move is meant to reassure allies who were once part of the Soviet bloc against Russian aggression.
Jean-Claude Juncker, European Commission President said: "Our actions, our resources compliment each other. But today we have decided to do more."
One of NATO's main concerns coming into the summit was the fragile state of the European Union after Brexit. This was the first meeting of US and EU leaders since the British referendum result.
In his speech, American President Barack Obama said: "An integrated Europe is one of the greatest political and economic achievements of modern times. And this is an achievement that has to be preserved."
The EU and NATO also signed a joint declaration to step up co-operation in cyber-attack defence, marine security and information exchange, and work together to clamp down on human trafficking.
In perhaps the biggest result of the day, the 28-nation Western defence alliance decided to move four battalions of up to 4,000 troops into northeastern Europe - a sign of readiness to defend eastern members against any Russian threat.
According to Jens Stoltenberg, NATO's Secretary-General, ”No one talked about any military presence of the kind we now see in Poland and the Baltic countries before Ukraine, before the illegal annexation of Crimea. ...It is defensive, it is proportionate, and it is fully in line with our international commitments."
Next week NATO will hold an ambassador-level meeting with Russian officials following the conclusion of the Warsaw Summit. The meeting will be held July 13 at NATO's Brussels headquarters.
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