MADRID (AP) – NATO declared Russia the “most significant and direct threat” to the peace and security of its members, as the military alliance met on Wednesday to address what the NATO leader called the biggest security crisis since World War II.
He also promised to “intensify political and practical support” in Ukraine while fighting the invasion of Russia.
But Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky rebuked NATO for not embracing its assaulted country more fully and called for more weapons to defeat Moscow forces.
Russia’s invasion of its neighbor broke the peace of Europe, pushed NATO to dump troops and weapons into Eastern Europe on a scale not seen since the Cold War, and he had to give the defense organization two new members in Sweden and Finland.
“President (Vladimir) Putin’s war against Ukraine has shattered peace in Europe and created the biggest security crisis in Europe since World War II,” Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said.
The alliance promised more support to Ukraine, which has already received billions in military and civilian aid from NATO countries. But Zelenskyy lamented that NATO’s open-door policy on new members did not seem to apply to his country.
“NATO’s open door policy should not resemble the old turnstiles of the Kyiv subway, which remain open but close when you approach them until you pay,” Zelenskyi said via a video link to the leaders of the meeting of 30 NATO nations in Madrid. “Ukraine has not paid enough?”
He called for more modern artillery systems and other weapons and warned leaders that they had to provide Ukraine with the help it needed to defeat Russia or “face a delayed war between Russia and yourself.”
“The question is who is next? Moldova? Or the Baltics? Or Poland? The answer is: all,” he said. “We are deterring Russia from destroying us and destroying you.”
Zelenskyy has acknowledged that NATO membership is a distant prospect. The alliance is trying to strike a delicate balance, letting its member countries arm Ukraine without provoking a direct confrontation between NATO and Russia with a nuclear weapon.
According to NATO treaties, an attack on any member would be considered an attack on all and would trigger a military response from the entire alliance.
U.S. President Joe Biden, whose country provides most of NATO’s military power, vowed that the Madrid summit would send “an unmistakable message … that NATO is strong and united.”
“We are stepping up. We are proving that NATO is more needed now than ever, “Biden said. He announced a strong boost to the U.S. military presence in Europe, including a permanent U.S. base in Poland, two more Navy destroyers with based in Rota, Spain, and two more F35 squadrons in the United Kingdom.
However, tensions have also arisen between NATO allies as the cost of energy and other essential goods has skyrocketed, in part due to war and harsh Western sanctions on Russia. There are also tensions over how the war will end and what concessions, if any, Ukraine should make to stop the fighting.
Money can also be a sensitive issue: only nine of NATO’s 30 members currently meet the organization’s goal of spending 2% of gross domestic product on defense.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, whose country has reached the target, urged NATO allies “to dig deep to restore deterrence and ensure defense in the next decade.”
The war has already sparked a major increase in NATO forces in Eastern Europe, and the Allies are expected to agree at the summit to increase the alliance’s rapid reaction force by almost eight times. , from 40,000 to 300,000 soldiers, next year. The troops will be based in their home countries, but will be dedicated to specific countries on the eastern flank of NATO, where the alliance plans to stockpile equipment and ammunition.
Stoltenberg said it was part of the “biggest overhaul of our collective defense since the end of the Cold War.”
Leaders are also willing to publish NATO’s new strategic concept, its set of priorities and goals once every decade.
The last such document, in 2010, called Russia a “strategic partner.” Now, the alliance is ready to declare Moscow its No. 1 threat. The paper will also outline NATO’s focus on issues from cybersecurity to climate change and China’s growing economic and military reach.
For the first time, leaders from Japan, Australia, South Korea and New Zealand are attending the summit as guests, a reflection of the growing importance of the Asia-Pacific region.
Stoltenberg said China was not an opponent of NATO, but posed “challenges to our values, our interests and our security.”
Biden was to hold a rare meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol on the sidelines of the summit, which focused on North Korea’s nuclear program.
The summit opened with a resolved issue, after Turkey agreed on Tuesday to lift its opposition to Sweden and Finland’s accession to NATO. In response to the invasion, the two Nordic nations abandoned their long-standing non-aligned status and called for joining NATO as protection against an increasingly aggressive and unpredictable Russia, which shares a long border. with Finland.
NATO operates by consensus, and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan threatened to block the Nordic couple, insisting that they change their position on Kurdish rebel groups that Turkey considers terrorists.
After urgent high-level talks with the leaders of the three countries, Stoltenberg said the impasse had cleared up.
Turkey praised Tuesday’s deal as a victory, saying the Nordic nations had agreed to crack down on groups Ankara sees as threats to national security, including the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, which is also considered a terrorist group by the United States and the United States. EU, and its Syrian. extension. He said they also agreed “not to impose embargo restrictions in the field of defense industry” in Turkey and to take “concrete steps for the extradition of terrorist offenders.”
Stoltenberg said the leaders of the 30-nation alliance will issue a formal invitation to the two countries on Wednesday. The decision must be ratified by all individual nations, but he said he was “absolutely confident” that Finland and Sweden would become members.
Stoltenberg said he hoped the process would be completed “sooner,” but did not set a time.
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Associated Press writer Zeke Miller in Madrid contributed.
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