An 11th hour deal that paved the way for NATO hopefuls Sweden and Finland to soon become members was the result of weeks of political wrestling across European capitals and calibrated U.S. involvement. But moments before a deal was struck, it still looked like it was going nowhere.
After two hours of intense discussions on Tuesday before a NATO summit in Madrid, the leaders still struggled to bridge certain sticking points, with the parties repeating in frustration their existing stances, Finland's Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto told Reuters in an interview.
