(Reuters) Anne Kauranen - In an interview with Reuters on Tuesday, Finland's President Alexander Stubb defended his country's decision to buy arms from Israel, saying it had no link to Finland's unwillingness to recognize an independent Palestinian state at the present time. Finland is acquiring the high altitude, David's Sling missile defense system from Israel. Helsinki considers the system a high priority for its own defense due to neighboring Russia's ongoing missile attacks on civilian and military targets in Ukraine. Stubb, who took office in March, has defined Finland's new foreign policy stance as "values-based realism," which was about "achieving things in the world as it is," instead of "promoting only the world as how I want to see it." He added that the time was not right to recognize a Palestinian state, even though its Nordic neighbors, Sweden and Norway, have done so.
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