NATO Chief Opens New Unit in Romania

NATO's Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg was due in Romania on Thursday on his first official visit, to discuss consolidation of the Alliance's capacities on its eastern flank and open a NATO Force Integration Unit, NFIU.

Stoltenberg was due to meet President Klaus Iohannis, acting Prime Minister Gabriel Oprea and the Foreign and Defence ministers.

Two NATO structures are being set up in Bucharest. Besides the NFIU, the Multinational Division Command, a military unit, is to be opened by the end of the year.

NFIUs are designed to allow for more effective coordination between national forces and NATO's Very High Readiness Joint Task Force. Besides Romania, they are being set up also in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Bulgaria.

Romania strongly supports NATO plans to boost its military presence on its eastern flank in the context of the conflict in neighbouring Ukraine.

Last week, the US Defense Secretary, Ash Carter, announced that Bulgaria, Romania, Poland and the Baltic countries had agreed to station NATO heavy equipment on their soil, in a move aimed to strengthen the Alliance's Eastern defences in case of an emergency with Russia.

The US has already started to deploy 600 more marines in southeastern Romania at the Mihail Kogalniceanu Airport Administrative Center.

Following the new deployment, the total size of the US military in Romania will reach up to 1,600 troops. Mihail Kogalniceanu Airport became a major US military base in 2007.

Romania, which has a 694km-long border with Ukraine, has been among the strongest regional backers of Western sanctions against Russia since it annexed the Crimean peninsula.

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