Finnish President calls on West to maintain 'friendly' relations with Russia

Finnish President Sauli Niinisto on Sunday called on the West to maintain 'friendly relations' with Russia. "I don’t mean any great friendship, but the capability to tolerate, even understand each other a bit," Niinisto said in an interview earlier yesterday. He continued that there will be a trust factor that will be needed after the Ukraine conflict ends, adding that the West must ensure that 'a new war is not waiting behind the door'.

"It is important for Western countries to find a way to maintain relations with Russia," Finnish President Sauli Niinisto said on Sunday in an interview, according to Russia's state-affiliated news agency Sputnik. 

"We’re in a very sensitive situation. Even small things can change matters a great deal and unfortunately for the worse. That is the risk of such large-scale warfare. The risk that nuclear weapons could be used is tremendous," the Finnish president added.

World must worry about 'possible escalation of conflict into a big war, that’s world war': Niinisto

Niinistö also underscored the looming risks of a nuclear war, as he stressed that the countries supplying weapons to Ukraine "need to take into account the possible escalation of the conflict into a big war, that’s world war." Previously, just months after Russia declared an all-out war on Ukraine, the Finnish President notified Russian leader Vladimir Putin in a phone call that his Nordic nation plans to apply for NATO membership. The conversation happened as Putin warned that Finland, which shared the border with Russia, joining the military bloc NATO, would be a mistake that could endanger the two nations’ neighbourly ties. 

Finland, however, became NATO's newest member on April 4 this year upon depositing its instrument of accession to the North Atlantic Treaty. Niinisto told Putin that fundamentally, the Russian demands aiming at preventing countries from joining NATO and its invasion of Ukraine "altered the security environment of Finland," according to a May statement. Finnish leader had an 'open and direct' conversation with Russia's President Putin without escalation. 

Putin had asserted that abandoning Helsinki's traditional policy of military neutrality "would be a mistake since there are no threats to Finland's security. Such a change in the country's foreign policy may have a negative impact on Russian-Finnish relations." Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Aleksandr Grushko later was reported as saying that Russia has no hostile intentions toward neighbouring Finland.