Majority of Finns want to join Nato before Sweden: poll

By AFP
February 03, 2023

HELSINKI: A majority of Finns want to go ahead and join Nato even if Sweden´s membership is delayed, a poll suggested on Thursday, after Turkiye said it could accept Finland without Sweden.

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More than half of respondents, 53 percent, replied negatively when asked “whether Finland should wait for Sweden” even “if it takes longer to ratify Sweden´s accession, for example because of opposition from Turkiye”.

Only 28 percent believed Finland should wait for Sweden and enter the US-led military alliance together. The poll by Taloustutkimus, published by Finnish daily Ilta-Sanomat, surveyed 1,021 Finns between January 30 and February 1. Finland and Sweden dropped decades of military non-alignment and applied to join Nato in May last year in response to Russia´s invasion of Ukraine.

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