Senate President Tariceanu: We must enlarge NATO's presence on entire eastern flank territory

Senate President Calin Popescu-Tariceanu stated on Wednesday, within the opening session of the B9 Parliamentary Summit, that Romania feels the need to see that NATO's command structure is better represented in the east of the Alliance.

"I hope that the Brussels Summit in July adopts decisions allowing NATO's presence on the Eastern flank to keep up with the times. I would like to evoke here the common background that our nations have, their exit, almost three decades ago, from the last cold war and their release from the regimes associated with the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact. (...) 30 years later, after the fall of communism, when Romania is part of the eastern flank of NATO, as of 2004, as a border-country, we feel the need to see that NATO's command structure is better represented in the east of the Alliance. We must enlarge NATO's presence on the entire territory of the eastern flank, intensify the response to threats, offer a more active support to our partners by increasing the resilience to hybrid and cyber threats," the Senate President stated.

He underscored that Romania is the 6th allied state in respect to the GDP percentage spent on Defence.

"Over 33 percent of Romania's spending for defence in 2017 were earmarked to major equipment purchases, which represents the highest percentage of NATO, well above the 20 percent target. We actively participate in strengthening the deterrence and defence posture of NATO on the eastern flank, both on national soil and in Poland," Tariceanu stated.

Calin Popescu-Tariceanu also said that the main topics of the B9 meeting are the following: the advanced presence of NATO, the eastern flank contributions of NATO countries, the equitable burden sharing, defence and deterrence, projecting stability, fighting terrorism and military mobility.

"So far, the interventions have confirmed what is emerging as a basic principle at the other levels of B9, namely a shared perception, from the Black Sea to the Baltic Sea, regarding the necessity of our own efforts to strengthen the defence and deterrence potential, both by increasing the budget up to two percent of the GDP and by the firm support of allies, so that eastern risks and threats be addressed in a coherent and integrated manner," he stated.

Tariceanu also stated that the meetings at parliamentary level are important, including in view of mutual debate and information regarding the citizens' concerns in respect to the defence and security of their countries.

"It's important to enhance the degree of mutual knowledge by sharing our parliamentary concerns in respect to the pressure, which over the past years, tested our defence and deterrence positions, after the aggression at the Black Sea of the Russian Federation in 2014, first by illegally annexing Crimea and subsequently by fueling a prolonged conflict on the sovereign territory of our neighbor, to the north and east, Ukraine. The test and warning that we were given in 2008 have gone unanswered when Russia attacked Georgia, our neighbor in the east, on the other shore of the Black Sea. The EU and the US didn't enforce sanctions. (...) Over the past ten years, we have witnessed two aggressions of Russia in the Black Sea region. This is our priority task, as a stated at the Black Sea, namely be prepared in order to protect our own borders and, at the same time, contribute to the construction of the resilience capability in our eastern vicinity, marked by various nuances of conflict. We firmly position ourselves next to our partners and offer an active support with a natural prioritisation of the Republic of Moldova, Georgia and Ukraine," Tariceanu added. AGERPRES (RO - author: Irinela Visan, editor: Mihai Simionescu; EN - author: Rodica State, editor: Adina Panaitescu)