Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky arrived in Helsinki for a surprise visit this week that was greeted with much fanfare. This week's show breaks down the implications of that visit and asks what the key takeaways were.
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The visit came at an interesting time in Finland-Ukrainian relations, after a disastrous meeting at the White House when Zelensky was verbally attacked by President Donald Trump and vis Vice-President JD Vance.
Finnish President Alexander Stubb told an audience at Helsinki University that all eyes were on Russia, and Finland was waiting to see how things play out.
"It's quite clear now that Ukraine wants peace and a ceasefire," said Stubb. "Finland wants peace and a ceasefire. Europe wants peace and a ceasefire. The US wants peace and a ceasefire. And now the puck is in the Russian zone. And we're not sure if they actually want that."
But why is Finland such a resonant location for Ukraine's head of state? Why is there such universal support for Ukraine's struggle?
"We Finns, we have a lot of empathy towards Ukrainians who have been fighting against an aggressor who is waging an illegal war, which is breaching against UN Charter... and we know Russia is a neighbouring country for us. If Russia can do that to Ukraine, then perhaps it could do that against us. We have a very severe history with Russia and therefore we understand how difficult and how terrible the situation in Ukraine is," Tytti Tuppurainen, the chair of the Social Democrats' parliamentary group, told the show.
We also round up the rest of the week's news from around the country and share a tip on what to stream from Yle's Areena platform.
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Egan Richardson and Zena Iovino presented this episode of All Points North. The sound engineer was Panu Willman.
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