Niinistö and Haavisto was their stance on Finland's possible future membership of the UN Security Council. Niinistö said that, if a member, more active participation in peace keeping operations would be expected from Finland, while Haavisto emphasised civilian crisis management. In another YLE debate on 2 February, economic issues showed some distinctions between the two candidates with Niinistö underlining the importance of economic growth and restraining the growth of debt and Haavisto expressing concerns about the impacts of economic growth on the environment and inequality. Analysts Juhana Torkki and Pertti Timonen stated that both Niinistö an Haavisto tread carefully during campaigning prior to the runoff and that this campaign had less "drama" than that of the first round. Opinion polling First round Note: the Taloustutkimus polls in 2011 before November as well as the MC-Info polls and TNS Gallup poll on 17 January omitted those interviewees who could not choose a candidate. Second round Results The first round of the election was held in on 22 January, although 32.7% of eligible voters had cast their vote during the advance voting period between 11 and 17 January. The overall voter turnout in the first round was 72.8%. In the second round, 36.6% of votes were cast during the advance voting period between 25 and 31 January. The overall turnout in the second round was 68.9%. Since no candidate received a majority of votes in the first round, a runoff election was held on 5 February between Sauli Niinistö (37.0% of first round votes) and Pekka Haavisto (18.8% of first round votes). Niinistö won the second round with 62.6% of the vote and was thus elected as president. The result of the second round was verified on 8 February. Reactions First round Of the six candidates defeated on the first round, Väyrynen was the only one not to express his support for either of the second-round candidates. Soini and Essayah backed Niinistö, while Lipponen, Arhinmäki and Biaudet supported Haavisto. Mikael Jungner, the party secretary of the Social Democratic Party, said that he would not continue in his role due to the poor showing of Lipponen. References External links Ministry of Justice – Elections website 2012 2012 elections in Finland January 2012 events in Europe February 2012 events in Europe