The Kremlin has denied reports that Russia demanded Finland leave NATO.
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov commented on the reports on Friday, according to the Russian news agency Interfax.
– I am not aware of this. No, no such demand was made. This was certainly not discussed, Peskov told reporters.
He was responding to media reports about Russian demands concerning a new security architecture in Europe.
The German newspaper Bild reported earlier on Friday that Russian representatives had presented a series of demands in informal discussions that went far beyond Ukraine and would significantly reshape Europe’s security order.
According to Bild, Russia had demanded that Finland reverse its NATO membership. The proposal would also prevent NATO bases from being established in Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
The newspaper said the proposal originated from figures close to President Putin and had been discussed in connection with informal negotiations in Abu Dhabi.
Finnish Defence Minister Antti Häkkänen reacted strongly to the reported demands, saying that Finland’s NATO membership and the alliance’s defence arrangements were not matters for negotiation.
– Russia has sought its own spheres of influence for a very long time. Putin did the same in his demands in 2021, Häkkänen said.
According to Häkkänen, Moscow’s concept of reshaping Europe’s security architecture involves imposing restrictions on NATO and its defence arrangements.
– They want European NATO countries to impose restrictions on themselves that would serve Russia’s interests. Such matters are not up for negotiation. Russia knows that. It is completely outrageous even to suggest something like this, Häkkänen said.
He added that the more accommodating the West is towards Russian demands, the further Moscow will be prepared to test them.
Despite Peskov’s denial concerning Finland, the Kremlin has continued to call for an end to further NATO enlargement.
Peskov said on Thursday that Russia would not consider a verbal pledge that NATO would stop expanding eastward sufficient and that such a commitment should instead be put in writing.
He based the demand on Moscow’s long-standing claim that Russia was promised after the Cold War that NATO would not expand eastward. Western officials and scholars have disputed the claim that any general, binding commitment covering future NATO enlargement was ever made.
Finland joined NATO in April 2023 following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.