NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg reaffirmed in Bucharest on Tuesday the Atlantic Alliance’s support for Ukraine in the war with Russia “for as long as necessary” and that the organization will not retreat to this position.
“The message from Bucharest is that NATO will continue to support Ukraine for as long as it takes. We will not back down”said Stoltenberg at a forum in the Romanian capital, quoted by the Spanish agency EFE.
The forum preceded a meeting of the heads of diplomacy from the 30 member countries of NATO (English acronym for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization) to be held in Bucharest this Tuesday and Wednesday, strengthening support for Kiev as one of the topics on the agenda.
NATO is not directly involved in the war in Ukraine, but the organization and allies have supported Kiev in the conflict Russia started nine months ago.
That support includes the delivery of military equipment, which enabled Kiev to launch a counter-offensive and recapture territory under Russian control.
The NATO leader justified the military support to Kiev, which he described as “unprecedented”, with Ukraine’s “right to self-defense”.
Stoltenberg believed that Russian President Vladimir Putin is “failing in his brutal war of aggression” against Ukraine and responded with “more brutality” to his troops’ defeats.
Accused Russia of execution “intentional rocket attacks against cities and civilian infrastructure, hitting homes, hospitals and the power grid”🇧🇷
“This is terrible for Ukraine, but also difficult times for us in the rest of Europe and many other countries in the world.”said the former Norwegian Labor Prime Minister (2000-2001 and 2005-2013).
Stoltenberg said there was a “painful crisis in the cost of living” but insisted the highest price was paid by Ukrainians.
“In fact, we all pay a price for Russia’s war against Ukraine, but the price we pay is in money, while the price Ukrainians pay is in blood.”he claimed.
Stoltenberg warned of the “much higher price” that will be paid “for many years” if the world allows Putin to win the war.
He justified that the lesson that Putin and “other authoritarian leaders” will learn is this “can achieve their goals with brute force”so they will continue to use it.
Stoltenberg also reaffirmed that NATO is “ready to defend every inch of Allied territory”.
Before Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, Russia demanded guarantees from NATO in the form of treaties that the neighboring country would never be part of NATO and that Allied forces would withdraw their troops in Europe to the borders before the expansion to the East.
NATO refused these demands on the basis of its “open door” principle, and in the meantime Ukraine has formally applied to join the organisation, as have Sweden and Finland.
Bosnia and Herzegovina and Georgia, two countries that joined the Soviet Union along with Ukraine, have also asked to join NATO despite criticism from Russia.
Stoltenberg said the war demonstrated Europe’s “dangerous dependence” on Russian gas, and he said it should lead to an assessment of dependence on other countries he described as authoritarian, such as China.
“Of course we will continue to trade and deal economically with China, but we must be aware of dependencies, reduce our vulnerabilities and manage risks”he claimed.
Dependency on supplies from regimes like China is one of the topics on the agenda of NATO foreign ministers on Wednesday.
Stoltenberg said NATO is not becoming a global military alliance, but argued that China is moving closer to the Atlantic Alliance territory.
He said Beijing has a growing presence in cyberspace and in Africa or the Arctic, and that there are “several attempts by China to increase its presence in Europe with various activities and attempts to control critical infrastructure”.
In this sense, he argued that the security implications of economic decisions should also be taken into account, as is the case in the management of 5G networks.
Source: DN
