Iceland prime minister Katrin Jakobsdottir thinks her country should quit Nato and reject EU invites

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The Icelandic leader blamed the EU’s ‘undemocratic’ finance bloc for her decision to steer clear from another attempt of joining the Brussels project. Iceland last tried to join the EU in 2009 but abandoned its attempt in 2015, choosing to remain a member of the European Free Trade Association and European Economic Areas instead. Katrin Jakobsdottir also said she would quit the NATO defence alliance if it was her decision to make. She said: “"I don't think we should enter the EU right now. I don't think there is any reason to apply.”

"Personally, I'm critical towards the economic policies of the EU - the creation of the eurozone without any real centralised policies on taxes or fiscal policies,” she added, in an interview with Brussels news website EU Observer. "The European Central Bank has become really powerful without being very democratic. The economic policies of the EU have been really distant from people in the eurozone and they've created divisions that need not be there.” Ms Jakobsdottir doesn’t believe the attitude in Iceland has changed towards the EU, insisting: “It was controversial in 2009 and still is.” A recent poll of Icelanders found that 60 percent of people didn’t want the country to join the EU.

Ms Jakobsdottir believes Nato membership also isn’t supported by her compatriots. She said: “My party's position is that we are against Iceland's membership of Nato. However, we're the only party in Iceland's parliament that holds that position. “We - as the Left-Green party - recognise that there is a strong majority in Iceland in support of our Nato membership, but we don't favour the idea of a permanent military presence here in Iceland.” Iceland’s prime minister, however, doesn’t see her country’s free-trade agreement with Brussels as a negative.