Kremlin says Finland's NATO membership will affect Russian-Finnish relations

Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov has unexpectedly sharply commented on Finland's accession to NATO, calling it an encroachment on Russia's security and national interests.

Source. This was reported by the BBC.

"The Kremlin believes that this is another aggravation of the situation. NATO expansion is an encroachment on our security and national interests of Russia, we have talked about this. And this is how we perceive it. And, of course, this forces us to take countermeasures to ensure our own security both tactically and strategically," he said.

Today, on April 4, during a meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Brussels, Finland will officially join the bloc, becoming its 31st member.

So far, the Russian authorities have pretended to be indifferent to the process of Finland and Sweden joining the alliance, which has been going on since last year.

Earlier, Russian dictator Putin stated: "Russia has no problems with Finland and Sweden, their accession to NATO does not pose a direct threat."

Now Peskov has emphasized that Finland's accession to NATO is fundamentally different from Ukraine's intentions.

"Finland has never been anti-Russia, and we have never had any disputes with Finland," he said.

"This is what dictates the need for the special operation and the achievement of the goals," Peskov said.

The Kremlin spokesman also warned that Finland's accession to NATO would inevitably affect Russian-Finnish relations:

"The Alliance is still an unfriendly structure, and in many ways hostile to the Russian Federation," Peskov said.

Background. Read more about this in Mind's article "A blow to Putin": Finland becomes the 31st NATO member".