BRUSSELS, 7 Dec. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg stated that he is ready to help the alliance countries spend the 2% of GDP agreed upon at the Vilnius summit on defense if they do not know how to do this.
At the NATO summit in Vilnius this summer, the alliance countries agreed on a minimum target for defense spending of 2% of GDP. However, few of the bloc’s 31 countries actually carry out such spending in practice.
«If there are problems with spending two percent (on defense spending — ed.), I can help you, because we in NATO have many good opportunities for this, for example, support for Ukraine. Therefore, if you have unexpected money, I would invest it in supporting Ukraine,” the secretary general said at a joint press conference with Luxembourg Prime Minister Luc Frieden.
Russia previously sent a note to NATO countries over arms supplies to Ukraine. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov noted that any cargo that contains weapons for Ukraine will become a legitimate target for Russia. The Russian Foreign Ministry stated that NATO countries are “playing with fire” by supplying weapons to Ukraine. Press Secretary of the Russian President Dmitry Peskov emphasized that pumping Ukraine with weapons from the West does not contribute to the success of Russian-Ukrainian negotiations and will have a negative effect. Lavrov stated that the United States and NATO are directly involved in the conflict in Ukraine not only by supplying weapons, but also by training personnel in the UK, Germany, Italy and other countries.