President of Finland Alexander Stubb attends the opening of the Helsinki+50 Conference in Helsinki, Finland on July 31, 2025. The conference marks the 50th anniversary of the Helsinki Final Act. Photo: Mikko Stig / Lehtikuva
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Finnish President Alexander Stubb has urged European nations to make a decisive choice between authoritarianism and democracy, warning that continued cooperation with Russia weakens continental unity and undermines support for Ukraine.
Speaking at the Etyk+50 conference in Helsinki on Thursday, Stubb criticised unnamed European states whose nationalist leaderships, he said, are drifting toward Russia’s sphere of influence and eroding the shared principles that have underpinned Europe’s post-war order.
“In Europe, we are faced with an important decision,” Stubb said. “Between spheres of interest and the use of force, or the sovereignty of states and common rules and principles.”
Although he did not name specific countries, Stubb’s remarks appeared directed at Hungary and Slovakia. Both Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and his Slovak counterpart Robert Fico have pursued open dialogue with Russian President Vladimir Putin and taken positions at odds with broader EU and NATO strategies.
Stubb warned that accepting a world shaped by spheres of influence would strip sovereign nations of their autonomy.
“Returning to a world order in which spheres of influence dominate leads to a situation in which the citizens of independent, democratic states would not decide on their own affairs,” he said. “Instead, the undemocratic leaderships of another country would make those decisions.”
He said any prospect of normalising relations with Russia depends on the establishment of a just and durable peace in Ukraine. He predicted that Russia would remain on a path of militarisation for at least the next five to ten years.
“Russia will not become a peaceful democracy in that time,” Stubb said.
He also characterised Putin as “a strategic fool and a military failure” and said he doubted the Russian leader would challenge NATO’s Article 5, the clause guaranteeing collective defence.
The comments came amid growing concern within the EU and NATO over the weakening of unified support for Ukraine, now in the third year of resisting Russia’s full-scale invasion.
In June, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte warned that if countries like the UK did not increase defence spending, they “might as well start learning Russian.”
The Etyk+50 summit in Helsinki marked fifty years since the signing of the 1975 Helsinki Final Act, a Cold War-era agreement that laid the foundations for the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE). While the event commemorated past diplomatic milestones, it was overshadowed by current divisions in Europe over security and sovereignty.
HT
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Source: www.helsinkitimes.fi
