The EU leaves its possible withdrawal from the international anti-personnel mine treaty in the hands of Finland

MADRID Dec. 22 () –

The top diplomatic official of the European Union, Kaja Kallas, recalled this Sunday that the possible withdrawal of Finland from the Convention on the Ban of Anti-Personnel Mines (known as the “Ottawa Treaty”) is a decision that corresponds exclusively to the Finnish Government. and Brussels has no say in the matter.

The Finnish Parliament is going to discuss a citizen initiative that proposes the withdrawal of the treaty – first agreed in 1997 and which Helsinki joined in 2012 – and the resumption of the use of this weapon as an additional protection measure against Russia. particularly since Finland joined NATO in April last year.

The initiative has been championed by the former Chief of Defense of the Finnish Defense Forces, retired Admiral Juhani Kaskeala, who recalled in his petition that Finland now defends NATO’s longest land border with Russia (about 1,300 kilometers in length) and that Finnish accession to the treaty occurred in a context radically different from the current one, in the midst of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

This popular proposal, launched on Independence Day, December 6, collected the 50,000 signatures necessary for its parliamentary debate in just four days, while the President of Finland, Alexander Stubb, has already asked the Ministerial Committee for Foreign Policy and The country’s Security Council (UTVA) will draft a report on the matter by the beginning of next year, according to the Finnish public broadcaster YLE.

In this regard, Kallas, who is precisely in Finland on the occasion of the North-South mini-summit of the European Union, explained that “those who are part of the Ottawa Convention are Member States, therefore the competence is theirs, both whether they decide to join or not.

Kallas has acknowledged that this kind of debate is being reproduced in other EU Member States and has admitted that his opinion on anti-personnel mines is not completely defined.

“On the one hand, in times of peace, landmines cause a lot of damage, especially to animals, but also to children, and have many consequences. On the other hand, they are also quite effective in terms of defense,” he considered.

“These are the debates that must be held and I respect the Member States that are holding them, but the decision is theirs,” he reiterated.