NATO’s Nordic expansion: What implications for the EU? 

You can re-watch the entire event’s live-stream below:

 Following the outbreak of the war in Ukraine in February 2022, Finland and Sweden decided to apply for membership in the US-led NATO alliance. The two Nordic countries felt that Russia’s increasingly aggressive behaviour towards its neighbours had fundamentally imperilled their long-cherished policies of military non-alignment. Accession to NATO of Finland and Sweden would have significant implications for the Alliance such as increasing NATO’s border with Russia and reinforcing its Northern dimension. However, it would also have implications for the EU, which Finland and Sweden joined in 1995. Following NATO’s Nordic expansion, only four EU countries will remain outside the Alliance (i.e., Austria, Cyprus, Ireland, and Malta). 

To make sense of these implications, this event will focus on the following key questions: What would the NATO accession of Finland and Sweden mean for the EU? Would it impact how the two countries approach security and defence cooperation within the EU? What would EU security and defence cooperation look like after the NATO accession of Finland and Sweden?