The Secretary General of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), Jens Stoltenberg, warned on Tuesday of the proliferation of nuclear weapons throughout the world, particularly in China, which is increasing the “nuclear arsenal without any transparency”.
“NATO will be a nuclear alliance as long as there are nuclear threats,” the NATO Secretary General said via video conference at the start of the 18th Annual NATO Conference on Arms Control, Disarmament and Non-Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction.
Jens Stoltenberg considered that, in the immediate future, Russia is the main threat to the 31 member states that make up NATO and that the invasion of Ukraine, more than a year ago, “forms part of a long pattern of aggressive behavior” on the part of Moscow.
The rise of “provocative nuclear rhetoric” – “to ignore, violate and abandon most of the non-proliferation agreements that kept the world safe” – is part of a Russian strategy to “prevent NATO allies from helping Ukraine “, Stoltenberg completed.
However, Moscow is not the only concern: “China is increasing its nuclear arsenal without any transparency.”
The Secretary General of the Atlantic Alliance named the four countries whose nuclear proliferation most worries member states and the world: China, Russia, Iran and North Korea.
The purpose, he added, must be a commitment to denuclearization and a path towards a lasting peace and, in the opinion of the secretary general, NATO “plays an important role in that effort.”
Source: TSF
