Sanna Marin – Finnish Iron Lady
For many years, Finland was considered a master at reconciling Russia and the West, the French newspaper Figaro reminds. But, following the general conjuncture, the country is moving to NATO and may join as early as June, at the bloc's summit. Historians will record a paradox: a woman will lead a quiet neutral country to the military bloc. Who is she?
Sanna Marin, Prime Minister of Finland since 2019, has brought Finland very close to a very likely NATO membership in the context of the situation in Ukraine.
And the fact that Finland's accession to NATO is almost a done deal, says at least a statement made on Thursday by White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki. The representative of the US President assured Sweden and Finland that if they apply for membership in the alliance, their security will be ensured for the period of admission to NATO membership. "Of course, we strongly support NATO's open door policy and the right of each country to decide for itself what its foreign policy and security arrangements will be. Both Sweden and Finland are close and valuable partners of the United States in the field of defense," Psaki said. US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken also assured the Scandinavian countries of ensuring security for the transition period.
An amazing thing: by the will of fate, Finland is led to NATO by a very peaceful-looking 36-year-old young woman.
Yes, today everything is serious: gone are the days when Sanna Marin, the Prime Minister of Finland, got on the pages of gossip magazines because she spent an evening in a nightclub after contact with a Covid-19 patient. Or for the reason that she posted photos on social networks where she poses in a dress of a famous couturier.
Friendship with Russia was, it turns out, forced
Today, the conflict in Ukraine has radically changed the situation, and the press, as well as the opposition, are rallying around a female politician, since it fell to her to lead Finland to a very likely membership in NATO. A real revolution in this small Scandinavian country with 5.5 million inhabitants, for which neutrality and decades of non-participation in wars were something of a calling card. So the excitement is understandable.
For a long time under Swedish domination, and then conquered by the Russian Empire in 1809, Finland twice entered into confrontation with the Soviet Union, in 1939 and 1941. And the separation from the former Russian Empire in 1917 was not easy: Finland then had its own small civil war. Later, throughout the Cold War, Finland had to go through a difficult period of forced economic cooperation with its inconvenient neighbor.
Rapid rise
Previously, in order to survive and continue to exist as an independent country, Finland, which has 1,340 kilometers of land border with Russia, for many years elevated compromise and dialogue between East and West to the rank of a great art. Finland has been trying to reconcile the contradictions between Russia and the West for so long that it seems to have forgotten about itself how pragmatic, direct and decisive it can be. Just like Sanna Marin. Having become Prime Minister on December 10, 2019 and becoming the head of a coalition of four parties, she is playing an increasingly prominent role in the ranks of her Social Democratic Party (SDP).
Born in a family with modest means, the girl experienced a difficult childhood. Shortly after her birth, her mother, constantly beaten by her alcoholic husband, divorced. Then the mother fell in love with another woman. Raised by a homosexual couple, Sanna nevertheless received a school education, which she calls "mediocre" and "boring". Then there was admission to the Faculty of Public Administration at the University of Tampere, an industrial city in the south-west of Finland. Like most students, she worked part-time first in a bakery, then as a newspaper delivery boy and a cashier in a store to pay for her studies.
In 2006, she almost accidentally joined the youth movement of the Social Democratic Party and two years later ran in the municipal elections in Tampere. She then suffered a serious defeat. But it was the first and the last.
In 2012, she is running again, and this time the young woman wins a big victory. Having become the chairman of the municipality in January 2013, the following year she was elected the second vice-president of the SDP. In the 2015 legislative elections, she becomes a member of the Finnish Parliament. A member of parliament, an environmentalist and a feminist, but that's not enough for her. Appointed to the post of Minister of Transport in the coalition government of Social Democrat Antti Rinne in June 2019, she replaces him in December of the same year.
And so, at the age of 34, Sanna Marin becomes the youngest head of the most feminist government in the world (12 women for 8 men). She is married to former football player and now entrepreneur Markus Raikkonen, from whom she gave birth to a daughter in January 2018. Sanna Marin considers herself an "ordinary Finnish woman" and is now preparing to do something that no one could have foreseen a few years ago: "strengthen military cooperation with the European Union and join NATO." Whatever it takes and whatever happens after that.
Cyril Hofstein
