Page 7 - Nato

EU leaders meet today to discuss defence against Russia and handling Trump

EU leaders are expected to discuss what military capabilities they need in the coming years, how they could be funded and how they might cooperate more through joint projects

Nato is deploying eyes in sky and on Baltic Sea to protect vital cables

With its powerful camera, the French Navy surveillance plane scouring the Baltic Sea zoomed in on a cargo ship ploughing the waters below closer, closer and closer still until the camera operator could make out details on the vessel's front deck and smoke pouring from its chimney. The long-range Atlantique 2 aircraft on a new mission for NATO then shifted its high-tech gaze onto another target, and another after that until, after more than five hours on patrol, the plane's array of sensors had scoped out the bulk of the Baltic from Germany in the west to Estonia in the northeast, bordering Russia. The flight's mere presence in the skies above the strategic sea last week, combined with military ships patrolling on the waters, also sent an unmistakable message: The NATO alliance is ratcheting up its guard against suspected attempts to sabotage underwater energy and data cables and pipelines that crisscross the Baltic, prompted by a growing catalogue of incidents that have damaged ...

Not sure if US should be spending anything on Nato, says Donald Trump

Washington finances 15.8 per cent of the 32-member military alliance's yearly expenditure of around $3.5 billion, joint-largest share, alongside Germany

Russia rejects idea of Nato peacekeepers in Ukraine in event of a ceasefire

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who is seeking a meeting with Trump, said on Tuesday that at least 200,000 European peacekeepers would be needed to prevent a new Russian attack

Nato launches new Baltic sentry mission to protect undersea cables

NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte announced on Tuesday that the alliance is launching a new mission to protect undersea cables in the Baltic Sea region. Rutte said at a meeting in Helsinki with the leaders of NATO countries located on the Baltic Sea that the effort would be dubbed Baltic Sentry. It will involve a range of assets, including frigates and maritime patrol aircraft, among others, and will enhance our vigilance in the Baltic, Rutte told reporters. He also said that a small fleet of naval drones will be deployed to provide enhanced surveillance and deterrence. The meeting comes as a string of incidents in the Baltic has heightened concerns about possible Russian activities in the region.

Meeting Trump's military spending goals not easy: European defence firms

The defence ministers of Europe's five top military spenders said Monday they want to continue increasing their investments in defence but described meeting President-elect Donald Trump's challenge for them to raise spending to 5 per cent of their overall economic output as complicated. The defence ministers of Germany, France, Britain, Italy and Poland came together near Warsaw for a meeting in a new format that they established after Trump was re-elected last year. Their first meeting in this format of five NATO members was held in Berlin in late November. The five are seeking ways to maintain their support for Ukraine as US policy is expected to shift when Trump takes power. They also discussed how to strengthen Ukraine's own weapons production capacity. The German minister, Boris Pistorius, stressed at the start of the meeting that they all support a just peace for Ukraine, one in which Kyiv has a say over its fate. There are concerns in Europe that Trump could push Ukraine to .

Sweden to contribute up to 3 warships to reinforce Nato presence in Baltic

Sweden will contribute up to three warships to a NATO effort to increase the alliance's presence in the Baltic Sea as it tries to guard against sabotage of underwater infrastructure, the government said Sunday. The Swedish military also will contribute an ASC 890 surveillance aircraft, the government said in a statement. And the country's coast guard will contribute four ships to help monitor the Baltic, with a further seven vessels on standby. Sweden became the Western military alliance's 32nd member in March. It followed neighbouring Finland into NATO after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The government said this will be the first time that Sweden as a NATO ally contributes armed forces to the alliance's defence and deterrence. The decision comes as a string of incidents in the Baltic has heightened concerns about possible Russian activities in the region. The undersea cables and pipelines that crisscross the sea link Nordic, Baltic and central European ...

US lawmaker reintroduces bill to end Pakistan's major non-Nato ally status

Initially introduced by Biggs in January 2019, the bill has been reintroduced in every subsequent Congress but has not advanced legislatively in any attempt

Trump says he could understand Russian feeling with Nato on their doorstep

US President-elect Donald Trump on Tuesday said that he understands the Russian feeling with NATO being on their doorstep. You know, a big part of the problem was Russia for many, many years, long before (Russian President, Vladimir) Putin said, you could never have NATO involved with Ukraine. Now they've said that's been like written in stone. Somewhere along the line (US President, Joe) Biden said no, they should be able to join NATO. Well, then Russia has somebody right on their doorstep and I could understand their feeling about that, Trump told reporters at Mar-a-Lago in Florida. There were a lot of mistakes made in that negotiation. When I heard the way that Biden was negotiating, I said you're going to end up in a war and it turned out to be a very bad war. That war could escalate to be much worse than it is right now, he said in response to a question. My view is that it was always understood. In fact, I believe that they had a deal and then Biden broke it. They had a deal

Leaked files show Russia's military preparedness against Japan, South Korea

Leaked documents reveal Russia's military strategy to address its concerns over eastern borders in a potential NATO conflict. This is due to the potential involvement of US assets and regional allies

Nato calls for investigation of Azerbaijan Airlines crash that killed 38

An Embraer passenger jet crashed near the city of Aktau in Kazakhstan on Wednesday, killing 38 people

Trump's Nato push: Higher defence spending, continued aid to Ukraine

Trump plans to push Nato allies to increase defence spending to 5% of GDP while continuing aid to Ukraine, marking a significant shift in his foreign policy approach

Want Ukraine in stronger position for peace talks with Russia: Nato leader

NATO's secretary-general said he wants to discuss ways to put Ukraine in a position of strength for any future peace talks with Russia during a meeting on Wednesday with Ukraine's president and a small number of European leaders. But Mark Rutte appeared frustrated at growing speculation in NATO capitals about when those peace talks might start and whether European peacekeepers would be involved, saying that speaking publicly about it plays into the hands of Russian President Vladimir Putin. "High on the agenda is to make sure that the president, his team in Ukraine, are in the best possible position one day when they decide so to start the peace talks," Rutte told reporters as he welcomed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to his residence in Brussels. The focus, Rutte said, must be "to do everything now to make sure that when it comes to air defence, when it comes to other weapons systems, that we make sure that we provide whatever we can". He said that another issue up for .

Zelenskyy asks to deploy foreign troops to Ukraine before Nato membership

Ukraine, which has made a concerted push to obtain an invitation to join Nato, has insisted throughout the war that it needs security guarantees to prevent Russia launching another invasion

Trump calls for urgent ceasefire in Ukraine, says US' exiting Nato possible

Donald Trump on Sunday pushed Russian leader Vladimir Putin to act to reach an immediate cease-fire with Ukraine, describing it as part of his active efforts as president-elect to end the war despite being weeks from taking office. Zelensky and Ukraine would like to make a deal," Trump wrote on social media, referring to Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy. In a television interview that aired Sunday, Trump also said he would be open to reducing military aid to Ukraine and pulling the United States out of NATO. Those are two threats that have alarmed Ukraine, NATO allies and many in the US national security community. Asked on NBC's Meet the Press if he were actively working to end the nearly 3-year-old Ukraine war, Trump said, I am. He refused to say if he had spoken to Putin since winning the election in November. I don't want to say anything about that, because I don't want to do anything that could impede the negotiation, Trump said. Trump's call for an immediate cease-fi

Cyprus may become Nato member when conditions permit, says country's Prez

Cyprus could apply to become a member of NATO once its armed forces receive the necessary training and equipment with US help to bring them up to the standards of the world's premier military alliance, the president of the Mediterranean island nation said Thursday. President Nikos Christodoulides put Cyprus on a trajectory for possible NATO membership, ending weeks of media speculation about his government's intentions following his meeting with President Joe Biden in Washington last month. The development goes against Cyprus' long-held policy of neutrality harking back to the Cold War era, when it walked a political tightrope between Washington and Moscow. Christodoulides said that although Cyprus cannot join NATO at this time because of objections that alliance member Turkey would raise to its potential membership, the Cypriot National Guard shouldn't be denied the opportunity to upgrade its defensive capabilities with US assistance. Turkey, which maintains more than 35,000 troop

Nato chief Rutte meets Trump in Florida for talks on global security

US President-elect Donald Trump and the head of NATO have met for talks on global security, the military alliance said Saturday. In a brief statement, NATO said Trump and its secretary general, Mark Rutte, met on Friday in Palm Beach, Florida. They discussed the range of global security issues facing the Alliance, the statement said without giving details. It appeared to be Rutte's first meeting with Trump since his November 5 election. Rutte had previously congratulated Trump and said his leadership will again be key to keeping our Alliance strong" and that he looked forward to working with him. Trump has for years expressed scepticism about the Western alliance and complained about the defence spending of many of its member nations, which he regarded as too low. He depicted NATO allies as leeches on the US military and openly questioned the value of the alliance that has defined American foreign policy for decades. He threatened not to defend NATO members that fail to meet ...

Nato, Ukraine to hold talks after Russia's attack with hypersonic missile

NATO and Ukraine will hold emergency talks Tuesday after Russia attacked a central city with an experimental, hypersonic ballistic missile that escalated the nearly 33-month-old war. The conflict is entering a decisive phase, Poland's Prime Minister Donald Tusk said Friday, and taking on very dramatic dimensions. Ukraine's parliament canceled a session as security was tightened following Thursday's Russian strike on a military facility in the city of Dnipro. In a stark warning to the West, President Vladimir Putin said in a nationally televised speech that the attack with the intermediate-range Oreshnik missile was in retaliation for Kyiv's use of US and British longer-range missiles capable of striking deeper into Russian territory. Putin said Western air defence systems would be powerless to stop the new missile. Ukrainian military officials said the missile that hit Dnipro had reached a speed of Mach 11 and carried six nonnuclear warheads each releasing six submunitions. Speak

Ukraine's Parliament cancels session after Russia fired hypersonic missile

Russian troops also struck Sumy with Shahed drones overnight, killing two people and injuring 12 more, the regional administration said Friday morning

President-elect Donald Trump announces US envoys to Nato and Canada

US President-elect Donald Trump has announced his envoys for NATO and Canada, following his nominations for ambassador to Israel and Special Envoy to the Middle East. Trump said on Wednesday that Acting Attorney General Matthew G Whitaker will be the US Ambassador to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), while former Congressman Pete Hoekstra has been nominated as Ambassador to Canada. Hoekstra represented Michigan's 2nd District in Congress for nearly 20 years, during which he was also Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. I overhauled the disastrous NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement), the worst Trade Deal in the History of the United States, which was switched to the USMCA (Mexico/Canada), which no one thought could be done. We brought Trade with Mexico and Canada to a level playing field for our wonderful farmers and working families, Trump said. In my second term, Pete will help me once again put AMERICA FIRST. He did an outstanding job as United State