The new NATO special reporter Maria Stenroos is immediately occupied by Sweden’s still pending NATO membership and the Vilnius summit in July.
Maria Stenroos, NATO special reporter, is already familiar with monitoring the military alliance from her previous work assignments, e.g. in political editorial and correspondent period in Brussels in 2014–2016.
Since then, Finland’s security policy has changed. NATO membership became a reality, and Stenroos wants to open up about its meaning.
– It is essential and interesting to see how Finland takes an active role. Do we look at our own concerns or do we consider the safety concerns of others. As a member of the union, you have to listen to others and at the same time take care of your own safety interests.
Maria Stenroos describes that NATO is now in its basic mission, responding to the Russian threat.
– On the other hand, the United States also has security concerns in the Indo-Pacific region. Finland and hopefully soon Sweden will bring the northern corner to NATO, but there are challenges elsewhere as well.
Stenroos is also interested in Finland’s role in NATO. Finland will have peacetime tasks, such as possible participation in air surveillance in the Baltics and Iceland or possible sending of troops to Eastern Europe. These will be resolved during the fall.
The discussion about nuclear weapons is interesting
Finland’s NATO membership also brought with it a discussion about nuclear weapons.
– Now it seems that Finland’s line is very open. Finland participates in all the work and probably also in the training that is done in NATO related to nuclear weapons.
According to Stenroos, some of the information related to nuclear weapons is secret.
– The journalist has enough to worry about.
Stenroos’s home base is in Helsinki and he travels wherever needed to follow the news.
– I expect that NATO will become commonplace very soon and we will go from celebrations to the level of everyday life. Let’s talk, for example, about the use of money. It is not a community of values like the EU, but a practical way of organizing defense. Naturally, the celebrations are explained by Finnish history and politics. NATO has very little influence on the everyday life of ordinary people.
According to Stenroos, one of the challenges of the job is how to get people interested in NATO-related issues. An experienced political journalist is excited to start a new career.
– As a counterweight, gardening and spending time at the sea and by the sea with the family.