NATO Secretary General with the Prime Minister of Estonia 🇪🇪 Kristen Michal, 22 OCT 2024

Описание: Joint press conference with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte and the Prime Minister of Estonia, Kristen Michal, in Tallinn, Estonia, 22 October 2024.

🗣 | NATO Secretary General:

Prime minister Michal, dear Kristen,

Thank you so much for welcoming me today in beautiful Tallinn. Good to be back.

It is a pleasure to be here, and to meet with you.

Estonia is a valued NATO Ally, and has been for 20 years now.

Your country contributes a great deal to our shared security.

You host NATO’s UK-led multinational battlegroup in Tapa, helping to deter aggression on the Eastern flank of our Alliance.

I look forward to visiting the base tomorrow and meeting the troops there.

Estonia also hosts a new regional hub for DIANA and NATO’s Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence here in Tallinn, and NATO’s Baltic Air Policing at Ämari Air Base.

I welcome Estonia’s significant contribution to NATO’s high readiness forces, and your efforts to further improve readiness.

By spending over 3% of your GDP on defence, Estonia is truly leading by example.
And I know you intend to invest even more in our shared security in the coming years.

Investing more is something all Allies will need to do, to meet our capability targets.

This is essential for us to continue to deter and defend against the challenges we face.

Here in Estonia, you know how close some of those challenges can be.

My first official travel as NATO Secretary General was to Kyiv, where I met with President Zelenskyy and reiterated NATO’s steadfast commitment to Ukraine.

Estonia is among Ukraine’s strongest supporters, having provided over 500 million Euros of military aid since 2022.

And you have committed to supporting Ukraine with at least 0.25% of your GDP for the years to come.

Today we discussed how to bolster our support for Ukraine, now, through the difficult winter ahead, you already mentioned it, and also for the long-term.

Russia continues to attack Ukraine’s critical energy infrastructure. And as winter approaches, our support to Ukraine remains critical.

We are also working hard to deliver on the commitments made at the Washington Summit in July.
Including a new Command to coordinate security assistance and training for Ukraine,
And our financial pledge of at least 40 billion euros in 2024.

We also discussed ways to further strengthen NATO’s defences.
Including steps to make this region more secure.

This week, Germany inaugurated a new NATO naval command centre for the Baltic region,
which will better protect key supply and trade routes, and critical infrastructure,
making the Baltic waters safer and more secure.

Dear Kristen, thanks again for your steadfast commitment to our transatlantic Alliance.

It’s an honour to be here, and I look forward to working with you, and of course maybe to answer a few questions.

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