Ukraine Russia Conflict: Finland and Sweden will be welcomed 'with open arms' into NATO

Roberta Metsola, the president of the European Parliament, and Jens Stoltenberg the secretary general of Nato, said "It is, of course, for Finland and Sweden to decide whether they would like to apply for membership in Nato or not. But if they decide to apply, Finland and Sweden will be welcomed with open arms to Nato. Finland and Sweden are our closest partners."

"We will continue to call for further sanctions, and we will continue to call for the enforcement of the current packages of sanctions in a better way and more effective way. This we will continue also to discuss in Strasburg next week, but in our case, this parliament will continue to build on the momentum of this unprecedented coordination that we have, which is extremely important, because we share the fundamental values and we share our defence of Ukraine’s right to defend itself" he further.

Meanwhile, Russia on 24th February launched the war on Ukraine. And, according to the latest updates Vladimir Putin has warned any countries attempting to interfere in Ukraine would be met with a “lightning-fast” response from Moscow. Russia has warned other EU customers may be cut off from Russian natural gas supplies if they refuse to pay in roubles. However, the  White House denounced Russia’s move to cut off energy supplies to Poland and Bulgaria. Press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters at a daily briefing on Wednesday: “Unfortunately this is the type of step, the type of almost weaponising energy supplies that we had predicted that Russia could take in this conflict.” Commenting on this Volodymyr Zelenskiy described Russia’s actions as amounting to “energy blackmail” against Europe in his nightly national address. Zelenskiy said Russia’s decision to cut off gas supplies to Poland and Bulgaria shows “no one in Europe can hope to maintain any normal economic cooperation with Russia”.