February 11, 2024

Finland’s former prime minister, Alexander Stubb, completed a surprise political comeback on Sunday by winning a closely fought runoff to become the Nordic state’s president after seven years in the political wilderness. 

The result will have been closely watched in European capitals and beyond given Finland’s strategically important location along the EU and NATO’s eastern border with an increasingly aggressive Russia. The country’s president leads its foreign policy alongside the government, and serves as Finland’s commander-in-chief. 

Stubb, a member of the mainstream center-right National Coalition Party (NCP), beat former Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto of the center-left Green Party in the runoff, 51.6 percent to 48.4 percent.  

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