NATO Secretary General, Press Conference at Foreign Ministers Meeting, Bucharest Romania 29 NOV 2022

decisions. But I am absolutely sure that the allies will maintain their support. And that will also include support for Ukraine in dealing with the devastating consequences of attacks on the power grid. Let me add that, of course, we must help them repair and replace what has been damaged. But we also need to support them to defend themselves. To shoot down incoming drones and missiles. That is the best way to protect Ukrainians against these attacks. And to ensure that President Putin does not manage to weaponize winter. But concrete figures must wait until the allies have made their promises.

Then, as for training, well, NATO allies, as you mentioned, have trained Ukrainian troops for many years. I remember very well that I went to Yavoriv, ​​on the outskirts of Lviv, in 2015. And there I saw how the United Kingdom, the United Kingdom, the United States and Canada, trained the Ukrainian forces and NATO, which has been there For many years, it helped build capabilities and modernize its armed forces. And, of course, we will also be able to do so in the future. Exactly what kind of framework it will be made in, I don't care much about that. What matters is that NATO allies in different formats are training Ukrainian troops.

I recently visited the United Kingdom, where countries, of course the United Kingdom, Canada, but Finland, Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands and many more allies are training thousands of Ukrainian troops. And I also welcome the initiative of the European Union that there will also be many NATO allies who will provide training. Therefore, training will take place in many formats. NATO offers different types of capacity development, also education. And overall this makes a huge difference for the Ukrainian Armed Forces. NATO Spokesperson Oana Lungescu: Anadolu. Mustafa Öztürk, Anadolu: Mustafa Öztürk, Anadolu Agency. First of all, thank you very much for the opportunity.

I have two questions. Mr. Secretary General, Sweden says that the country is taking the necessary measures to eliminate the Türkiye concern. However, we continue to see PKK terrorist groups demonstrating across the country and they are throwing terrorist materials at the Turkish embassy building. Do you think Sweden is making efforts to eliminate Türkiye's concerns? Furthermore, my second question concerns the growing security concerns in the Western Balkan countries, especially in Bosnia Herzegovina and Kosovo since the beginning of the war in Ukraine. How can NATO address these concerns? Thank you so much. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg: First of all, whether Finland and Sweden join NATO and to what extent they fulfill what they promised, if I understood the question correctly.

Then, first, all allies, including Turkey, made a historic decision in June to invite Finland and Sweden. All allies have signed the Accession Protocol. And already 28 of 30 allies have ratified the Accession Protocols. This is a very fast adhesion process. We welcome you. And we do so, among other things, because we know that Finland and Sweden's membership in the Alliance will strengthen NATO, strengthen the transatlantic bond and make us all safer and more secure. In Madrid, at the NATO Summit, Finland, Sweden and Türkiye agreed on the joint memorandum. I will say that we support and facilitate those negotiations.

I know they were difficult negotiations, but they agreed. And Finland and Sweden are already implementing it and have achieved it. Which means that Sweden, for example, has changed its constitution. Sweden has tightened and strengthened terrorism laws. We see that there have been expulsions and also that Sweden has lifted any restrictions on arms exports to Türkiye. In addition to that, we have established that they have put in place a mechanism to ensure that this continues. That there will be a permanent effort on the part of Finland and Sweden to work together with Türkiye to address terrorist threats.

Of course, this is important for Türkiye, but it is also important for all allies. And sometimes there are also very close links between terrorist groups and organized crime in other NATO allied countries, including Sweden, other NATO countries and other European countries. So, but let me add one more thing. When it comes to individual decisions, on expulsions or extraditions, that falls to the Swedish courts. This is the rule of law. So what politicians do is decide the laws and make them stricter. But at the end of the day, you need evidence that can be presented in court if you want a specific person extradited from Sweden.

And this is how it works in democratic States with the rule of law and an independent judiciary. Then, briefly, regarding the Western Balkans, of course we are concerned. We have members, we have partners in the Western Balkans. We have the NATO KFOR mission in Kosovo with around 4,000 soldiers, which helps ensure peace and stability. And we also have our headquarters and our presence in Sarajevo and of course we also work very closely with the European Union to help stabilize the region. NATO Spokesperson Oana Lungescu: We will go to Romanian television, the lady there. Ilinca Nazarie, TVR Romania: Hello Secretary General, last night President Klaus Iohannis said that we need concrete plans to know where and who sends troops.

So he asked me if they talked about logistics? Was there any concrete plan   after today's discussions? Do they involve Romania on the eastern flank? Thank you. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg: We have plans in place. NATO has plans to protect and defend all allies. And those are also the plans we activated when Russia invaded Ukraine. And we activated that same morning. And that has led to an increased NATO presence, now 40,000 troops under NATO command in the eastern part of the Alliance, all supported by significant air and naval forces. And SACEUR, our Supreme Allied Commander has been given the authority to add even more forces, if he deems it necessary.

So we have plans. Then, of course, we are constantly evaluating those plans, developing them. And in Madrid, at the Madrid Summit we made decisions to further strengthen our force structure, based on many different measures, but the key elements will be an increased presence, especially in the eastern part of the Alliance, increased force readiness , a group of several 100,000 troops that can be rapidly deployed; and then more prepositioned equipment. And, to a greater extent, also more specific forces. For example, we have seen that Germany has already followed up, because Germany is the lead nation of the battle group in Lithuania.

And now they are developing a brigade that can be or will be deployed to Lithuania. With some equipment, they will know the terrain, they will know the national defense forces and this concept of more and more troops will further strengthen NATO's ability to protect and defend all allies. NATO Spokesperson Oana Lungescu: ARD. Markus Preiss, ARD: General Secretary, Marcus Preiss of ARD, German television. I have a question. Everyone says that Putin is using the cold and winter as weapons. I'm a little surprised that you're talking about this on November 29th right now. Has he been late in addressing that type of weapon?

Thank you. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg: Well, we have been addressing this issue for a long time, among other things by providing air defense systems. I think the most effective thing NATO allies do is help the Ukrainians shoot down incoming missiles and drones from Russia. And we also know, and this was also shared by Minister Kuleba, that actually a fairly high proportion of incoming Russian drones and missiles are disabled. So without the important modern air defense systems that the allies have provided, we would have seen much more devastating attacks and much more damage, including to gas, power and the electrical grid.

So, of course, what we see now is a very deliberate attack on this critical infrastructure. To me, it's obvious that this actually reflects that President Putin is failing on the battlefield. Because since they can't resist the fact that Ukraine has liberated local territory, the way they can respond is by attacking civilian targets and, of course, there are thousands of cities, there are hundreds of energy facilities. And, of course, there is no way to defend them all at the same time. But that's also why we're stepping up and urging allies to provide even more. And then try to mitigate both with generators, fuel, spare parts.

It's about defending, it's about repairing and it's about replacing your energy infrastructure and we're doing everything at the same time. NATO Spokesperson Oana Lungescu: Well, we will answer one last question. Journal TV, Lady in Pink, from Moldova. Iulia Sarivan, Journal TV, Republic of Moldova: Thank you, Journal TV, Republic of Moldova. Thus, the latest security incidents caused by Russian missiles launched against Ukraine and which closed the airspace of the Republic of Moldova, and one of which fell on Moldovan territory, have once again put the vulnerability of the security system in the public debate. Moldovan defense. How could allied countries support Moldova in this regard?

Thank you. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg: Well, Moldova is a NATO partner. Moldova has a very close relationship with the European Union and many allies also provide different types of bilateral support to Moldova. I recently met with the President of Moldova, Maia Sandu, and we had a very extensive discussion about ways in which we can try to expand our partnership, of course respecting the fact that Moldova does not aspire to be a member of NATO, Moldova is a country neutral. And we are looking at how we can work more closely with Moldova in different areas, but we also welcome the fact that NATO allies and the European Union are also providing economic support to Moldova to help them mitigate the consequences that they are seeing, and due to the war in Ukraine.

Moldova, being so close to war, has suffered a lot. And the only and best way to really end this is for President Putin to end the war. This brutal war of aggression is really bad for Ukrainians, but it also has ramifications around the world, with rising energy prices, food prices, and power outages in a country like Moldova. So the lasting way to end these problems is for President Putin to end this senseless war. NATO Spokesperson Oana Lungescu: Thank you very much. This concludes this

press

conference

. See you tomorrow. Thank you.