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Baltic defense ministers agree on common strategy towards NATO summit

Xinhua, December 15, 2015 Adjust font size:

Lithuanian, Latvian and Estonian defense ministers agreed to work together to achieve favorable decisions at the upcoming NATO summit, Lithuania's defense minister Juozas Olekas announced here on Monday.

Olekas met with his Baltic counterparts on Monday to discuss security issues of the region and come up with a common strategy in preparation for the NATO summit in Warsaw next year. He said one of the hoped-for favorable decisions at the summit included increasing deployment of the rotation NATO forces in the Baltic region.

"It is important to ensure a favorable NATO agreement on the present and additional long-term measures of deterrence in the Baltic region at the upcoming NATO summit," Olekas was quoted as saying in a statement released by the ministry.

"The defense ministers of Estonia and Latvia and I have agreed to combine our efforts to achieve an increase in the rotational NATO forces deployed in our region up to the size of a battalion in each of the Baltic States," he added.

"We work not as three separate countries, but as one country, when we talk about our core interests, and one of the core interests, clearly, is security," said Estonian defense minister Hannes Hanso.

Olekas, Hanso, and Latvia's acting minister of defense Raimonds Bergmanis underscored the importance of ensuring a permanent presence and pre-positioning of weaponry of NATO allies in the Baltic region, in order to strengthen NATO commitment to the collective defense.

"We think that air policing is a good and visible NATO presence and demonstrates NATO commitment, but we should work and think further," Bergmanis said in the press conference.

In their joint communique signed on Monday, the three ministers expressed their solidarity with France in light of recent attacks there, and underlined the Baltic countries' readiness to support France in its activities in fighting terrorism.

They also welcomed the decision by alliance foreign ministers to invite Montenegro to start NATO accession talks.

The need to strengthen cooperation among the Baltic States in the area of search and rescue in the Baltic Sea was underlined during the meeting as well.

According to the Lithuanian defense ministry, the Baltic defense ministers will go to Ukraine on Monday and meet their Ukrainian counterpart to discuss potential assistance to Ukraine in its development of military forces and implementing defense sector reform. Endit