London — President Biden was in London Monday morning for a whistlestop, 24-hour visit to the United Kingdom before heading for a NATO leaders summit in Lithuania. The first meeting on Mr. Biden’s agenda after his Sunday night arrival was a sit-down with U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak at his residence at No. 10 Downing Street. It was the president’s first in-person discussion with a fellow world leader on the European trip as the U.S. and its NATO allies look to maintain a unified voice in support of Ukraine as it battles Russia’s ongoing invasion.
Mr. Biden was heard saying as he walked into the British prime minister’s official residence that the U.S. has “no closer friend and greater ally” and that the relationship remained “rock solid.”
There has been concern in Europe over the Biden administration’s decision to send controversial weapons to Ukraine, but also over the future of U.S. government backing for Ukraine when Mr. Biden’s first term comes to an end. On both points, the U.S. leader will be looking to reassure America’s closest allies that Washington remains not only a committed partner but one that respects their humanitarian concerns.
Mr. Biden has spoken with Sunak a handful of times in recent months and their Monday meeting at Downing Street lasted only about 40 minutes.
It came after the U.S. announced its latest military aid package for Ukraine, which for the first time includes controversial cluster munitions. The move has divided U.S. allies, some of which — including the U.K. — have long banned use of the bombs.
Over the weekend, Sunak said the U.K. “discourages” the use of cluster munitions. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said Friday, however, that NATO does not have a position on the weapons and that their use is not on the agenda for the summit that Mr. Biden will fly to join in Lithuania after his stop in London.
Another issue facing Mr. Biden and Sunak, and then the other NATO leaders this week, is Sweden’s pending accession to the transatlantic alliance. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine drove the previously neutral countries of Finland and Sweden to apply for NATO membership. Finland has already become a full NATO member but Turkey and Hungary have so far blocked Sweden from joining.
President Biden shakes hands with U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak ahead of their meeting at 10 Downing Street in London, July 10, 2023.
Chris J. Ratcliffe/Bloomberg/Getty
Mr. Biden was expected to speak Monday with Sunak about conditions for a possible deal with Turkey to clear the way.
Ukraine also wants to join NATO, but allowing that to happen would infuriate Russia, likely draw sharp criticism from China and is a more contentious issue among the alliance’s existing members.
In an interview aired by CNN over the weekend, Mr. Biden said he didn’t think Ukraine was “ready for membership in NATO.”
“If the war is going on, then we’re all in a war,” he said, adding that there are other qualifications Ukraine must still meet to be considered for membership, including full “democratization.”
After his meeting with Sunak, Mr. Biden left central London for the roughly one-hour drive west, to have his first in-person meeting with King Charles III at Windsor Castle. Though not an official state visit, some classic British pomp and circumstance was organized for Mr. Biden’s stop at the ancient home of the British monarchy, including a guard of honor and a marching band.
Mr. Biden has met Charles on multiple occasions, but not since the king’s formal coronation ceremony on May 6. Mr. Biden did not attend the ceremony as he had just been in Britain for a separate trip, but first lady Jill Biden was there.
One of the two heads of states’ recent meetings was at the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow, in November 2021. On Monday, they were expected to discuss environmental issues and greet attendees from a climate finance forum that took place in the morning. Mr. Biden and Charles are expected to discuss with businesses leaders how private industry can best tackle climate change.
As President Biden prepares to head to Europe for the NATO summit in Lithuania later this week, Democratic Sen. Chris Coons of Delaware tells “Face the Nation” that although Ukraine has applied to join NATO “we can’t admit Ukraine to NATO right now” amid the war with Russia.
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Ankara hasn’t seen sufficient progress from Sweden to support its application to join NATO, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan warned U.S. President Joe Biden in a phone call Sunday ahead of a summit of NATO leaders this week.
“Erdoğan stated that Sweden has taken some steps in the right direction by making changes in the anti-terrorism legislation,” Turkey’s communications directorate said in a statement following the bilateral call.
But the supporters of “terrorist organizations” — pro-Kurdish groups including the PKK and YPG, which are banned in Turkey — continue to hold demonstrations in Sweden, the statement said. “This nullifies the steps taken,” it said.
The call comes ahead of a two-day summit of NATO leaders in Lithuania that starts on Tuesday. Biden has thrown his support behind a push to get a deal done on Sweden at the meeting in Vilnius.
Erdoğan’s administration has been blocking Sweden’s hopes of joining the defense alliance, accusing Stockholm of backing Kurdish separatism. While it had initially accused Finland of doing the same, Erdoğan later gave the green light on Helsinki’s application and the country became a NATO member in April.
Biden and Erdoğan also discussed the sale of U.S. F-16 fighter jets to Turkey in the call, with the Turkish president “noting that it is not correct to associate” Ankara’s request for F-16 aircraft with Sweden’s NATO membership bid, according to the statement.
On the call, Erdoğan also brought up Turkey’s “desire to revive the EU membership process,” according to the statement. The Turkish president said he would like to see EU member states send a “clear and strong message” in support of its EU bid at the NATO summit in Lithuania.
While Turkey became a candidate for full membership of the EU in 1999, talks have effectively stalled over the past decade. The country has not committed to making the reforms required to meet the criteria set out by Brussels.
Erdoğan and Biden agreed to meet face-to-face in Vilnius and discuss Turkey-U.S. bilateral relations and regional issues in detail, according to the Turkish statement.
VILNIUS — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Monday agreed to drop his resistance to Sweden joining the NATO alliance and to submit the ratification to the Turkish parliament “as soon as possible,” the alliance’s Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told reporters.
“Sweden will become a full member of the alliance,” Stoltenberg said ahead of a summit of NATO leaders starting Tuesday.
He said Erdoğan had given a “clear commitment” to move on Sweden’s accession.
The Turkish’s leader’s change of position came after a meeting with Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson and Stoltenberg.
In a joint statement following the talks, Turkey, Sweden and NATO underlined that Stockholm had changed laws, expanded counter-terrorism cooperation against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and restarted arms exports to Turkey.
Ankara and Stockholm also agreed to create a “new bilateral Security Compact” and that Sweden will present a “roadmap as the basis of its continued fight against terrorism in all its forms,” the statement said.
As part of the deal, Stoltenberg has also agreed to create a new post of “Special Coordinator for Counter-Terrorism” at NATO.
The announcement comes after over a year of wrangling to get Turkey and Hungary to sign off on admitting Sweden and Finland into the alliance, with NATO leaders publicly and privately lobbying the Turkish leader to expand the alliance roster.
Sweden and Finland both ditched their traditional neutrality in the wake of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and asked to join the alliance in May 2022.
The accession of the two countries — which have long been close partners of the Western alliance — was easily approved by most NATO members, with Turkey holding out. Finland joined in April following approval by Turkey’s parliament in March.
But Sweden proved to be a thornier problem, with Erdoğan denouncing the presence of Kurdish groups in Sweden. Relations were also inflamed when protesters in Sweden burned copies of the Quran.
Earlier on Monday, Erdoğan linked a change of position on Sweden to a revival of his country’s moribund effort to join the European Union. The recently re-elected Turkish president also met with European Council President Charles Michel on Monday evening.
The Council leader described the session as a “good meeting,” tweeting that the two “explored opportunities ahead to bring” the EU’s cooperation with Turkey “back to the forefront & re-energise our relations.”
Sweden promised to “actively support efforts to reinvigorate” Turkey’s EU membership bid in a seven-point agreement with Ankara. Stockholm also agreed it will not support other Kurdish militant groups and to boost economic cooperation with Turkey.
The next step, according to the agreement, is that Turkey “will transmit the Accession Protocol for Sweden to the Grand National Assembly, and work closely with the Assembly to ensure ratification.”
In a statement after the announcement, U.S. PresidentJoe Biden welcomed the agreement and said: “I stand ready to work with President Erdoğan and Turkey on enhancing defense and deterrence in the Euro-Atlantic area.”
Although Hungary has also refused to back Sweden’s NATO bid, Stoltenberg noted that Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán had promised that his country would not be the last holdout against Sweden’s membership.
Sweden has one of the most capable militaries in Europe and its entry into NATO together with Finland will solidify the alliance’s control of the Baltic Sea.
The agreement on the night before the summit’s official program starts removes a major headache for Stoltenberg and the alliance’s leaders, who are also dealing with Ukrainian demands that Kyiv be given a clear path to membership.
Opinions across NATO differ on how fast Ukraine could become a member. Those disagreements will likely be front and center on Wednesday when Biden holds one-on-one talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Jacopo Barigazzi, Jonathan Lemire, Paul McLeary and Alexander Ward contributed reporting.
VILNIUS — It’s one problem down and one to go for the NATO alliance as leaders prepare to meet for a summit in the Lithuanian capital.
Sweden’s troubled membership bid was accepted by Turkey’s president late Monday but the tricky issue of formulating acceptable language on Ukraine’s membership aspirations still hasn’t been agreed.
After intensive talks on the summit communiqué, there was still no final deal on what will be offered to Ukraine, although a senior NATO diplomat said: “We have made very good progress and I am 100 percent optimistic.”
Officials negotiating the language on Ukraine are now expected to reconvene on Tuesday, the same day leaders will begin their two-day meeting.
“I believe it is coming together — it is very close,” said a second senior NATO diplomat, who like others was granted anonymity to discuss sensitive negotiations.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy upped the pressure on the alliance on Monday, demanding that NATO send a clear signal his country will join once the war with Russia is over.
“Even if different positions are voiced, it is still clear that Ukraine deserves to be in the Alliance. Not now — there is a war, but we need a clear signal. And we need this signal right now,” Zelenskyy said.
Kyiv’s bid to join NATO after hostilities are over has widespread backing among alliance members, but has run into resistance from Germany and the United States. While all allies formally agree Ukraine will become a member one day, Berlin and Washington are hesitant about offering Ukraine a concrete path to membership, preferring to focus on Kyiv’s immediate needs to battle the Russian invasion.
“I don’t think there is unanimity in NATO about whether or not to bring Ukraine into the NATO family now, at this moment, in the middle of a war,” U.S President Joe Biden told CNN in an interview that aired Sunday. He added that if Ukraine were a NATO member, “We’re at war with Russia, if that were the case.”
A senior German official said earlier on Monday: “The time is not right at this summit for an invitation to Ukraine, for concrete steps toward membership. There is no consensus on this among the allies either.”
Biden, who arrived in Vilnius on Monday, plans to meet with Zelenskyy on Wednesday.
Alliance leaders will be able to give their full attention to Ukraine on Tuesday after another big problem — Sweden’s stalled bid for NATO membership — was resolved after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan promised to put the issue to Turkey’s parliament.
BRUSSELS (AP) — NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg will stay in office for another year, the 31-nation military alliance decided on Tuesday.
Stoltenberg said in a tweet that he is “honoured by NATO Allies’ decision to extend my term as Secretary General until 1 October 2024.”
“The transatlantic bond between Europe and North America has ensured our freedom and security for nearly 75 years, and in a more dangerous world, our Alliance is more important than ever,” he said.
Stoltenberg, a former Norwegian prime minister, has been NATO’s top civilian official since 2014. His term had been due to expire last year but was extended then to keep a steady hand at the helm after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
U.S. President Joe Biden and his NATO counterparts had been due to name a successor when they meet in Vilnius, Lithuania, on July 11-12. But the world’s biggest security organization makes decisions by consensus, and no agreement could be found on a new candidate.
“With his steady leadership, experience, and judgement, Secretary General Stoltenberg has brought our Alliance through the most significant challenges in European security since World War II,” Biden said in a statement. “Today, our Alliance is stronger, more united and purposeful than it has ever been.”
Stoltenberg’s fellow countryman, Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre, welcomed the news, saying that it was “good, important and reassuring.”
“It is also important that this was now clarified before the summit in Vilnius next week,” Gahr Støre was quoted as saying by the Norwegian news agency NTB. He said that NATO’s unity “is particularly crucial in a troubled time of war in Europe.”
Most NATO countries had been keen to name a woman to the top post, and Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen was thought to be a favorite after a meeting with Biden last month.
The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, ruled out her candidacy. Other possible names floated, but never publicly named as in the running, were Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte and U.K. Defense Secretary Ben Wallace.
It’s the fourth time Stoltenberg has had his mandate extended. He’s the second-longest serving NATO secretary-general after former Dutch foreign minister Joseph Luns, who spent almost 13 years at the helm from 1971.
Quizzed repeatedly in recent weeks over whether he would agree to have his term renewed, Stoltenberg said that he was not seeking to stay and had no plans other than to continue to carry out his duties and wrap his time at the helm in September.
NATO secretaries-general are responsible for chairing meetings and guiding sometimes delicate consultations between the member countries to ensure that compromises are found so that an organization that operates on consensus can continue to function.
They also ensure that decisions are put into action and speak on behalf of all nations with one voice.
Stoltenberg has managed to tread a very fine line, refraining from criticizing members led by more go-it-alone presidents and prime ministers, like former U.S. President Donald Trump, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan or Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.
With NATO’s historical adversary, Russia, locked in a war with Ukraine, the process of naming a new secretary-general has become highly politicized.
Poland opposes the next secretary-general coming from a Nordic state after Stoltenberg’s long tenure, and that of his predecessor, Anders Fogh Rasmussen from Denmark. Polish officials wanted someone from a Baltic state. Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas was a preferred candidate.
But other countries are wary of accepting a nominee from the Baltics or Poland, given what appears to be their unconditional support for Ukraine, including on NATO membership, which the U.S. and Germany, among others, insist should not happen before the war ends.
In naming Fogh Rasmussen, a former Danish premier, their 12th secretary general in 2009, NATO’s leaders signaled that they wanted a government leader or president at the head of their organization. This has made the path almost impossible for Wallace.
Associated Press writer Jan M. Olsen in Copenhagen contributed to this report.
TORNIO, Finland/KARLSKRONA, Sweden, July 3 (Reuters) – High above a railway bridge spanning a foaming river just outside the Arctic Circle, Finnish construction workers hammer away at a project that will smooth the connections from NATO’s Atlantic coastline in Norway to its new border with Russia.
“We will be removing some 1,200 of these one by one,” says site manager Mika Hakkarainen, holding up a rivet.
Until February 2022, the 37-million euro ($41 million) electrification of this short stretch of rail – the only rail link between Sweden and Finland – simply promised locals a chance to catch a night train down to the bright lights of Stockholm.
After Russia invaded Ukraine, that changed.
Now Finland is part of NATO, and Sweden hopes to join soon.
As the alliance reshapes its strategy in response to Russia’s campaign, access to these new territories and their infrastructure opens ways for allies to watch and contain Moscow, and an unprecedented chance to treat the whole of northwest Europe as one bloc, nearly two dozen diplomats and military and security experts told Reuters.
“PUT RUSSIA AT RISK”
The Finnish rail improvements around Tornio on the Swedish border are one example. Due for completion next year, they will make it easier for allies to send reinforcements and equipment from across the Atlantic to Kemijarvi, an hour’s drive from the Russian border and seven hours from Russia’s nuclear bastion and military bases near Murmansk in the Kola peninsula.
Among forces based there, Russia’s Northern Fleet includes 27 submarines, more than 40 warships, around 80 fighter planes and stocks of nuclear warheads and missiles, data collected by the Finnish Institute of International Affairs (FIIA) shows.
In a military conflict with NATO, the Fleet’s main task would be to secure control of the Barents Sea and stop ships bringing reinforcements from North America to Europe through the waters between Greenland, Iceland and the UK.
That’s something Finland can help NATO resist.
“It’s all about containing those kinds of capabilities from the north,” retired U.S. Major General Gordon B. Davis Jr. told Reuters.
Maps showing marine traffic through the Baltic
Besides opening its territory, Helsinki is buying the right assets, particularly fighter jets, “to add value to (the) northeastern defence and, frankly, in a conflict put Russia at risk,” he said.
Sweden’s contribution will, by 2028, include a new generation of submarines in the Baltic Sea that Fredrik Linden, Commander of Sweden’s First Submarine Flotilla, says will make a big difference in protecting vulnerable seabed infrastructure and preserving access – currently major security headaches, as the September 2022 destruction of the Nord Stream gas pipelines read more showed.
“With five submarines we can close the Baltic Sea,” Linden told Reuters. “We will cover the parts that are interesting with our sensors and with our weapons.”
Analysts say the change is not before time. Russia has been actively developing its military and hybrid capabilities in the Arctic against the West, partly under the cover of international environmental and economic cooperation, the FIIA’s Deputy Director Samu Paukkunen told Reuters. Russia’s defence ministry did not respond to a request for comment.
Paukkunen’s institute estimates Western armed forces are militarily about 10 years behind Russia in the Arctic.
Even with the losses that Russia has sustained in Ukraine, the naval component of the Northern Fleet and the strategic bombers remain intact, Paukkunen said.
NATO-member Denmark phased out its submarine fleet in 2004, part of a move to scale back its military capabilities after the end of the Cold War, and it has yet to decide on future investments. Norway is also ordering four new submarines, with delivery of the first due in 2029.
“It seems to me that we have some catching up to do, because we haven’t done it properly for the last 25 years,” said Sebastian Bruns, a senior researcher into maritime security at Kiel University’s Institute for Security Policy.
Maps showing marine traffic through the Baltic
“A WHOLE PIECE”
Both developments show how the expanded alliance will reshape Europe’s security map. The region from the Baltic in the south to the high north may become almost an integrated operating area for NATO.
“For NATO it’s quite important to have now the whole northern part, to see it as a whole piece,” Lieutenant Colonel Michael Maus from NATO’s Allied Command Transformation told Reuters. He chaired the working group which led Finland’s military integration into NATO.
“With (existing) NATO nations Norway and Denmark, now we have a whole bloc. And thinking about potential defence plans, it’s for us a huge step forward, to consider it as a whole area now.”
This became clear in May, when Finland hosted its first Arctic military exercise as a NATO member at one of Europe’s largest artillery training grounds 25 km above the Arctic Circle.
The nearby town of Rovaniemi, known to tourists as the home of Santa Claus, is also the base of Finland’s Arctic air force and would serve as a military hub for the region in case of a conflict. Finland is investing some 150 million euros to renew the base to be able to host half a new fleet of 64 F-35 fighter jets, due to arrive from 2026.
An undated artist’s rendition depicts divers and an unmanned vehicle exiting the A26 submarine. Saab AB/Handout via REUTERS
For the May manoeuvres, nearly 1,000 allied forces from the United States, Britain, Norway and Sweden filled the sparse motorways as they joined some 6,500 Finnish troops and 1,000 vehicles.
Captain Kurt Rossi, Field Artillery Officer of the U.S. Army, led a battery bringing in an M270 multiple rocket launcher.
It was first shipped from Germany across the Baltic Sea, then trucked nearly 900 km to the north.
“We haven’t been this close (to Russia) and been able to train up in Finland before,” Rossi said.
If there was a conflict with Russia in the Baltic Sea area – where Russia has significant military capabilities at St. Petersburg and Kaliningrad – the shipping lane NATO used for that exercise would be vulnerable. Finland relies heavily on maritime freight for all its supplies – customs data shows almost 96% of its foreign trade is carried across the Baltic.
The east-west railway link across the high north will open up an alternative, which could prove crucial.
“I think the Russians can quite easily interrupt the cargo transportation by sea so basically this northern route is the only accessible route after that,” said Tuomo Lamberg, manager for cross border operations at Sweco, the Swedish company designing the electrification.
Maps showing marine traffic through the Baltic
“NOTHING BEATS THEM”
But that risk, too, may recede when Sweden joins NATO.
Down beneath the Baltic Sea waterline, the submarine commander Linden shows a reporter the captain’s quarters of the Gotland, one of four submarines currently in Sweden’s fleet, which will bring NATO’s total in the Baltic countries to 12 by 2028.
The Kiel institute expects Russia to add one to three submarines in the coming years, to bring its Baltic submarine total to four, along with its fleet of around six modern warships. Its capabilities at Kaliningrad also include medium-range ballistic missiles.
“This can be the loneliest place in the world,” says Linden, who captained the vessel for many years. On a typical mission, which lasts two to three weeks, there is no communication with headquarters, he said.
The Gotlands, like Germany’s modern Type 212 submarines, will be among NATO’s most advanced non-nuclear submarines and can stay out of port for significantly longer than most other conventional models, the researcher Bruns said read more .
“I would say, without a doubt, that the Gotland-class and the German Type 212 are the most capable non-nuclear submarines in the world,” said Bruns.
“There is nothing that beats them, quite literally. In terms of how quiet they are, the engines they use, they are particularly quiet and very maneuverable.”
In submarine warfare, Linden said, the primary question is where the adversary is. A careless crew member dropping a wrench or slamming a cupboard door can lead to detection.
“We talk quietly on board,” Linden said. “You shouldn’t believe … films where orders are shouted.”
The Gotland is based at Karlskrona, about 350 km across the Baltic from Kaliningrad. With an average of 1,500 vessels per day trafficking the Baltic according to the Commission on Security and Cooperation In Europe, it is one of the world’s busiest seaways – and there is really only one way out, the Kattegatt Sea between Denmark and Sweden.
The shallow and crowded seaway can only be accessed through three narrow straits that submarines can’t pass through without being detected.
LISTENING POWERS
If any of the straits were to be closed, the sea freight traffic to Sweden and Finland would be hit hard and the Baltic states completely cut off. But with Sweden in the alliance, that becomes more preventable, because Sweden’s submarines will add to NATO’s listening powers.
Linden says the Gotland’s crew can sometimes hear Russia’s vessels. The range of sound travel varies partly depending on the seasons. In winter, he said, you can hear as far as the island of Oeland – just a bit further than the distance between London and Birmingham in the UK.
“You can lie outside Stockholm and hear the chain rattling on Oeland’s northern buoy,” Linden said. “In the summer you can hear maybe 3,000 meters.”
By 2028, once Sweden takes delivery of a new design of vessel, this capacity will increase. The new design, known as A26, will allow submarine crews to deploy remotely operated vehicles (ROVs), combat divers or autonomous systems of some sort without putting the submarine or crew at risk, Bruns said.
“Depending on the mission it could be an ROV that safeguards a pipeline or data cable, it could be combat divers that go ashore in the cover of darkness, it could be almost anything.”
That capacity will increase Sweden’s scope to control comings and goings through the Baltic.
“If you count all the forces, with Germany in the lead and Sweden and Finland coming on board, all those have really shifted the balance in the Baltic Sea quite significantly,” said Nick Childs, Senior Fellow for Naval Forces and Maritime Security at the International Institute for Strategic Studies.
“It would make it very difficult for the Russian Baltic Sea fleet to operate in a free way,” he said. “But it could … still pose challenges for NATO.”
Anne Kauranen reported from Tornio, Johan Ahlander from Karlskrona; additional reporting from Gwladys Fouche in Oslo, Jacob Gronholt-Pedersen in Copenhagen and Sabine Siebold in Brussels; Edited by Sara Ledwith
NATO allies have agreed to extend Jens Stoltenberg’s term as secretary-general by a year.
“Honoured by NATO Allies’ decision to extend my term as Secretary General until 1 October 2024,” Stoltenberg tweeted. “The transatlantic bond between Europe & North America has ensured our freedom & security for nearly 75 years, and in a more dangerous world, our Alliance is more important than ever,” he added.
The decision, ahead of a summit of NATO leaders in Vilnius next week, is seen as a reflection of how politically sensitive the current moment is for the alliance, as well as how difficult it is for allies to find a high-profile candidate who is both available and acceptable to all alliance members.
The former Norwegian prime minister has served as the defensive alliance’s chief since 2014, earning widespread respect for his calm demeanor under pressure and ability to navigate the sensitivities of a large and diverse alliance.
In 2017, allies opted to extend the secretary-general’s term until the end of September 2020. In 2019, they moved that date to September 2022. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine prompted another extension, which was set to run through September 2023.
Over the past months, allies informally considered a variety of candidates, including Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, before opting yet again to extend the long-serving secretary-general’s term.
Clarification: This article has been updated to reflect the process for extending Jens Stoltenberg’s term.
BRUSSELS — NATO is crafting its new military plans assuming Moscow will make a comeback.
Speaking to reporters on Monday, Admiral Rob Bauer, chair of the NATO military committee, said that although the bulk of Russia’s land forces are fighting in Ukraine, he believes the Kremlin’s forces are still a threat.
“We are convinced that the Russians are going to reconstitute,” he said. “And therefore, the plans are built on not the actual status of the Russian army, but on the status of the Russian army before they attacked Ukraine.”
Russia, Bauer said, “will learn lessons from that war” and NATO “will continue to look at them as a serious threat.” That includes in the seas, in the air and in space, where Russian forces “are still very, very capable,” in addition to nuclear capabilities.
“We should never underestimate the Russians and their ability to bounce back, as they have shown in history a couple of times,” he added.
Next Tuesday and Wednesday, the Western alliance’s leaders will gather in Vilnius, where they will sign off on historic new regional military plans and discuss how to boost investment in defense as Russia continues its war in Ukraine.
Speaking about NATO’s new military plans, Bauer underscored how the summit will mark the beginning of a long implementation process.
“We have to go and do our work — to reach the higher number of forces with a higher readiness, we need to exercise against the plans, we need to buy the capabilities that we require,” he said, “and that will take time.”
Executing the plans ranges from more recruitment to ensuring sufficient weapons and ammunition are being produced — along with more resources dedicated to defense.
“We need more money, collectively, to pay for that,” Bauer said. Plus, NATO’s new model for high-readiness forces will require “making sure that the nations have a mechanism in place to increase the numbers of people that are available for the armed forces.”
Asked about the status of Ukraine’s counteroffensive, the admiral pushed back against a narrative of disappointment with Ukrainian forces.
“It is extremely difficult, this type of operation,” the chair stressed. “I think the way they do it is commendable,” he said, “and I think they are — for good reasons — in some places cautious.”
Air exercises come amid growing number of intercepts between NATO and Russian military planes over the Baltic and Black Sea.
Russia has started tactical fighter jet exercises over the Baltic Sea with the goal of testing readiness to perform combat and other special operations, the country’s defence ministry has said, a day after Moscow said its jets had scrambled to intercept United Kingdom military planes over the Black Sea.
“The main goal of the exercise is to test the readiness of the flight crew to perform combat and special tasks as intended,” Russia’s defence ministry said on Tuesday.
“The crews of the Su-27 [fighter jets] of the Baltic Fleet fired from airborne weapons at cruise missiles and mock enemy aircraft,” the ministry announced on the Telegram messaging channel, adding that as well as improving skills, Russian fighter pilots are on “round-the-clock combat duty” guarding the air space of Russia’s Kaliningrad exclave.
Wedged between Poland and Lithuania on the Baltic coast, Kaliningrad is Moscow’s westernmost state and was part of Germany until the end of World War II. Given to the Soviet Union at the Potsdam Conference in 1945, the enclave has roughly 1 million residents – mainly Russians but also a small number of Ukrainians, Poles and Lithuanians.
Russia said last year that it had deployed warplanes armed with state-of-the-art Kinzhal hypersonic missiles to the Chkalovsk airbase in Kaliningrad as part of its “strategic deterrence”.
On Monday, the Russian defence ministry said that it had scrambled two fighter jets as UK Typhoon warplanes approached its border above the Black Sea and that the planes had “turned around and distanced themselves from the Russian border” following intervention from Russia’s fighter planes. The Typhoon jets were accompanying an RC-135 reconnaissance aircraft, the defence ministry said.
“The Russian planes safely returned to their airfield. There was no violation of the Russian border,” the ministry said.
Interceptions involving Russian and Western military aircraft have multiplied over the Black Sea and Baltic Sea in recent months amid growing tensions over Moscow’s war in Ukraine.
On Sunday, the UK’s Ministry of Defence said that Royal Air Force (RAF) Typhoon fighter aircraft operating with the NATO Baltic Air Policing mission in Estonia have scrambled to respond to Russian aircraft 21 times in the last 21 days. The RAF fighters are currently operating out of Estonia as part of NATO’s “quick reaction alert” to secure its eastern European flank.
“The RAF Typhoons launch to monitor the Russian aircraft when they do not talk to air traffic agencies, making them a flight safety hazard,” the UK defence ministry said in a statement on Sunday.
“These intercepts are a stark reminder of the value of collective defence and deterrence provided by NATO,” the UK’s Defence Secretary Ben Wallace said.
RAF Typhoons in Estonia scrambled this afternoon to intercept a Russian Tu-134 ‘CRUSTY’ and 2x Su-27 ‘FLANKER’ Bs flying close to @NATO airspace. The Russian aircraft failed to comply with international norms and did not liaise with the relevant airspace control agencies. pic.twitter.com/XlEpK5onLv
In May, Moscow said it had intercepted four US strategic bombers above the Baltic Sea in two separate incidents in one week. In April, a US Reaper military drone crashed in the Black Sea after a confrontation with two Russian fighter jets. Washington blamed risky manoeuvres by Russian fighter jets for causing the drone to crash.
Russia also scrambled warplanes to intercept French, German and Polish aircraft.
Ukraine’s counteroffensive against Russian forces has been “slower than desired”, but Ukrainian forces will not be pressured into speeding up, the country’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said, while Russian President Vladimir Putin said Moscow had observed a “lull” in Kyiv’s campaign.
Ukrainian forces are being slowed in their advance by vast minefields laid by Russian forces, Zelenskyy told to the United Kingdom’s BBC in an interview on Wednesday. With some 200,000 square kilometres (more than 77,000 square miles) of Ukrainian frontier territory littered with Russian land mines, the Ukrainian leader said that “at stake is people’s lives”.
“Some people believe this is a Hollywood movie and expect results now. It’s not,” Zelenskyy told the BBC.
“Whatever some might want, including attempts to pressure us, with all due respect, we will advance on the battlefield the way we deem best,” he said.
Confirming that Ukrainian forces had retaken eight villages in the south and east of the country, Zelenskyy also said that Ukraine would never negotiate while Russian forces remain on Ukraine’s territory and that the conflict would not be allowed to stagnate.
“No matter how far we advance in our counteroffensive, we will not agree to a frozen conflict” which would be “a prospectless development for Ukraine”, he said.
Zelenskyy’s interview with the BBC coincided with a conference in London where allies pledged billions of dollars in economic and reconstruction aid, and on a day when Russia’s leader again said that Ukraine’s counteroffensive was faltering.
Contradicting the Russian president’s view of the conflict, the chief of Russia’s Wagner mercenary force, Yevgeny Prigozhin, accused Russian defence officials on Wednesday of not telling the truth about the progress of Ukraine’s counteroffensive.
Moscow was losing territory to Ukrainian forces, Prigozhin said, and Russian defence officials were hiding the truth.
“They are misleading the Russian people,” Prigozhin said in an audio message released by his spokespeople.
A number of villages have been lost and Russian troops are suffering from a lack of arms and ammunition, he said.
“Huge chunks have been handed over to the enemy,” Prigozhin said, warning that Ukrainian troops had already sought to cross the Dnipro river, a natural border on the front line.
“All of this is being totally hidden from everyone,” the Wagner chief said. “One day Russia will wake up to discover that Crimea too has been handed over to Ukraine,” he added.
The Washington, DC-based Institute for the Study of War (ISW) said on Thursday that Russian sources had noted a “relatively slower pace of Ukrainian offensive operations” in the west of the Donetsk and Zaporizhia regions in recent days. However, the ISW said that Ukraine had long indicated that its counteroffensive would be a “series of gradual and sequential offensive actions”.
Military analysts believe that Kyiv’s major counteroffensive operations have not yet started.
5/ Russian sources noted a relatively slower pace of Ukrainian offensive operations in both western #Donetsk and western #Zaporizhia oblasts compared to the previous days. https://t.co/hiIa26CVZt
“The success of Ukrainian counteroffensives should not be judged solely on day-to-day changes in control of terrain,” the ISW said.
“The wider operational intentions of Ukrainian attacks along the entire front line may be premised on gradually degrading, exhausting, and expending Russian capabilities in preparation for additional offensive pushes,” it said.
In his daily, late-night address on Wednesday, Zelenskky said that Ukrainian forces were “destroying the enemy” in the south of the country and making advances. In the east, “our defences are firming”, he said.
“And I am especially grateful, guys, for every shot down Russian helicopter … Each [shot] is important,” he said.
It appears increasingly likely that the 31 NATO members will be unable to coalesce around a candidate to be the alliance’s next secretary general and Jens Stoltenberg will be asked to remain in the job for an additional year, multiple sources told CNN.
Although there are a number of prospective candidates, including Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace, sources said there is a growing chance that there will not be agreement between the members on who should take over during what is a critical period for the defensive alliance as the war in Ukraine continues.
While some inside the White House would have liked to see a female NATO chief elevated for the first time, officials acknowledge that finding consensus has proven difficult.
The United States traditionally does not put forward a candidate, but their backing has major sway, and President Joe Biden views Stoltenberg as “a remarkable leader,” in the words of US Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
The former Norwegian prime minister has already extended his tenure once and has served in the role since 2014.
Biden and Stoltenberg met in the Oval Office last week, where the topic of his succession was expected to arise. White House officials have declined to say whether the president asked Stoltenberg to remain in job.
Asked about the prospect, Stoltenberg has repeatedly said he has “no intention of seeking extension of (his) term.”
“My only plan is to be focused on my task as secretary general and do my job here until my tenure end this fall and I’ve really no other plans,” he said at a news conference on Monday.
At a news conference in London on Tuesday, Blinken said “we’re in very close consultation with our allies and partners to determine where we want to go with NATO and its leadership.”
“We’re not pushing, promoting any particular candidate,” the top US diplomat said.
“The current Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has been, in President Biden’s eyes, a remarkable leader,” Blinken said.
“There are also some rather extraordinary people now who people were talking about as the next secretary general. And that’s a decision that we will all make collectively as an alliance,” he added.
As the war enters its 479th day, these are the main developments.
This is the situation as it stands on Saturday, June 17, 2023.
Fighting
The Commander of Ukraine’s ground forces, Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi, said the situation in the east of the country remains “tense” and plans for the ongoing counteroffensive against Russian forces need to be adjusted. “Despite the advance of our troops in the south and the loss of territory and settlements in this direction, the enemy continues to move some of the most combat-capable units to the Bakhmut direction, combining these actions with powerful artillery fire and strikes by assault and army aircraft on the positions of our troops,” he said.
Russia’s defence ministry said its forces repelled numerous attempts by Ukrainian forces in their ongoing counterattacks over the last 24 hours and inflicted significant losses in the south Donetsk and Donetsk directions. More than 500 Ukrainian soldiers were killed and five tanks were destroyed, the ministry said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin again rejected reports of Ukrainian counteroffensive successes on the front lines in Ukraine, saying that at “no point have they achieved their goals”. He also said Ukraine will soon run out of its own military equipment and will be totally reliant on the West.
Ukraine will send several dozen combat pilots to train on US-made F-16 fighter jets, Ukrainian air force spokesman Yuriy Ihnat said. NATO members the Netherlands and Denmark are leading efforts in an international coalition to train pilots and support staff, maintain aircraft and ultimately supply the F-16s.
Putin proclaimed the end of “neo-colonialism” in international politics and praised Russia’s economic strategy following its ruptured ties with the West. “The ugly neo-colonial system of international relations has ceased to exist, while the multi-polar global order is strengthening,” he said at an annual economic forum in Saint Petersburg.
Putin confirmed that Russia has sent nuclear arms to its ally Belarus. He also said that Russia could “theoretically” use nuclear weapons if there was a threat to its territorial integrity or existence.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken called it “ironic” that Putin had placed Russian nuclear arms in Belarus when Putin justified his invasion of Ukraine as an action to prevent Kyiv from obtaining nuclear weapons.
The White House denounced the comments from Putin on the possible use of nuclear weapons, adding that the US had made no adjustments to its own nuclear posture in response to the rhetoric.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Russia is ready for further talks on nuclear arms control, the Interfax news agency reported.
A delegation of African leaders visited Kyiv on a peace mission where they called on Russia and Ukraine to de-escalate and negotiate. Shortly after their arrival, air raid sirens sounded across Ukraine as Russian missiles were detected. “The launching of the missiles today does not deter us and has not stopped us from continuing to call for de-escalation,” South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy ruled out peace talks with Russia until a full withdrawal of Moscow’s forces from Ukraine.
United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan told Putin that his nation wished to strengthen ties with Russia. The Gulf state has not joined the West in placing sanctions on Moscow and has maintained what it says is a neutral position on the Ukraine war.
German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius said NATO allies may be ready to remove hurdles from Ukraine’s path to joining the NATO military alliance amid reports that the US is open to allowing Kyiv to forgo a formal candidacy process.
Turkey and Hungary must ratify Sweden’s NATO membership before the alliance meets at a summit in July, France said, adding that any further delays were not understandable and risked the security of the 31-member alliance.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin also urged Turkey’s new defence minister to approve Sweden’s NATO membership.
Putin said there was a “serious danger” that NATO could be pulled further into the Ukraine conflict.
Canada said it would bolster its force in Latvia as part of NATO with the deployment of 15 Leopard 2A4M tanks.
Russia’s foreign ministry said it summoned the Australian ambassador after authorities in Australia cancelled the lease of a land plot where a new Russian embassy complex was being built in Canberra.
Humanitarian aid
The United Nations estimates an “extraordinary” 700,000 people require drinking water in eastern Ukraine following the collapse of the Kakhovka dam.
The US will provide an additional $205m in humanitarian assistance to Ukraine, Secretary of State Blinken said.
It is unlikely that Russia will quit the Black Sea grain deal before it comes up for renewal on July 17, Russian media reported. But Russian officials said they see no grounds to extend the agreement beyond that date. “How can you extend something that doesn’t work?” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said.
Apartment block and warehouses hit in missile attack
President Zelenskiy condemns strike on his hometown
Air strike is latest of many since Russia invaded
KRYVYI RIH, Ukraine, June 13 (Reuters) – Eleven civilians were killed in a Russian missile attack that struck an apartment building and warehouses in Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s hometown of Kryvyi Rih on Tuesday, local officials said.
Emergency services said four were killed in the apartment block and seven at the warehouses, where officials said a private company stored goods such as fizzy drinks. Mayor Oleksandr Vilkul said none of the targets had military links.
A further 25 people were wounded, two of whom suffered severe burns and were in critical condition, the chief doctor of one of Kryvyi Rih’s hospitals told reporters.
Residents sobbed outside the burnt-out apartment block, from which smoke billowed after the early-morning attack on the central Ukrainian city.
Olha Chernousova, who lives in the five-storey apartment block, said she was woken by an explosion which sounded like thunder and thrown out of her bed by a violent blast wave.
“I ran to my front door, but it was very hot there… the smoke was heavy,” she said.
“What could I do? I was sat on the balcony, terrified I would lose consciousness. Nobody came for a long time… I thought I would have to jump into a tree.”
[1/6] Police officers stand next to the bodies of people killed by a Russian missile strike, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Kryvyi Rih, Dnipropetrovsk region, Ukraine June 13, 2023. REUTERS/Andrii Dubchak
Around her, the street and courtyard were strewn with glass and bricks. At least five cars were ruined husks.
Ihor Lavrenenko, who lives in a different part of the building, said he heard two blasts.
“I woke up from the first bang, a weak one, and went straightaway onto the balcony. Then the second one erupted overhead, I watched from my balcony as hot debris fell,” he said.
Zelenskiy, who was born in Kryvyi Rih, condemned the attack.
“Russian killers continue their war against residential buildings, ordinary cities and people,” he wrote on the Telegram messaging app. “Terrorists will never be forgiven, and they will be held accountable for every missile they launch.”
Russia has repeatedly struck cities across Ukraine since its full-scale invasion in February 2022 but denies targeting civilians. Moscow has also accused Ukraine of cross-border shelling as Kyiv carries out counter-offensive operations.
Ukraine’s military command said air defences had destroyed 10 out of 14 cruise missiles, and one of four Iranian-made drones, fired at Ukraine overnight.
Additional reporting by Lidia Kelly, Anna Pruchnicka and Aleksandar Vasovic; Editing by Timothy Heritage
Putin: Russia may create ‘sanitary zone’ in Ukraine
MOSCOW, June 13 (Reuters) – President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that any further mobilisation would depend on what Russia wanted to achieve in the war in Ukraine, adding that he faced a question only he could answer – should Russia try to take Kyiv again?
More than 15 months since Putin sent troops into Ukraine, Russian and Ukrainian forces are still battling with artillery, tanks and drones along a 1,000-km (600-mile) front line, though well away from the capital Kyiv.
Using the word “war” several times, Putin offered a barrage of warnings to the West, suggesting Russia may have to impose a “sanitary zone” in Ukraine to prevent it attacking Russia and saying Moscow was considering ditching the Black Sea grain deal.
Russia, he said, had no need for nationwide martial law and would keep responding to breaches of its red lines. Many in the United States, Putin said, did not want World War Three, though Washington gave the impression it was unafraid of escalation.
But his most puzzling remark was about Kyiv, which Russian forces tried – and failed – to capture just hours after Putin ordered troops into Ukraine on February 24 last year.
“Should we return there or not? Why am I asking such a rhetorical question?” Putin told 18 Russian war correspondents and bloggers in the Kremlin.
“Only I can answer this myself,” Putin said. His comments on Kyiv – during several hours of answering questions – were shown on Russian state television.
Russian troops were beaten back from Kyiv and eventually withdrew to a swathe of land in Ukraine’s east and south which Putin has declared is now part of Russia. Ukraine says it will never rest until every Russian soldier is ejected from its land.
Putin last September announced what he said was a “partial mobilisation” of 300,000 reservists, triggering an exodus of at least as many Russian men who sought to dodge the draft by leaving for republics of the former Soviet Union.
Asked about another call-up by state TV war correspondent Alexander Sladkov, Putin said: “There is no such need today.”
MOBILISATION?
Russia’s paramount leader, though, was less than definitive on the topic, saying it depended on what Moscow wanted to achieve and pointing out that some public figures thought Russia needed 1 million or even 2 million additional men in uniform.
[1/6] Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting with war correspondents at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia June 13, 2023. Sputnik/Gavriil Grigorov/Kremlin via REUTERS
“It depends on what we want,” Putin said.
Though Russia now controls about 18% of Ukraine’s territory, the war has underscored the fault lines of the once mighty Russian armed forces and the vast human cost of fighting urban battles such as in Bakhmut, a small eastern city one twentieth the area of Kyiv.
Putin said the conflict had shown Russia had a lack of high-precision munitions and complex communications equipment.
He said Russia had established control over “almost all” of what he casts as “Novorossiya” (New Russia), a Tsarist-era imperial term for a swathe of southern Ukraine which is now used by Russian nationalists.
At times using Russian slang, Putin said Russia was not going to change course in Ukraine.
Russia’s future plans in Ukraine, he said, would be decided once the Ukrainian counteroffensive, which he said began on June 4, was over.
Ukraine’s offensive has not been successful in any area, Putin said, adding that Ukrainian human losses were 10 times greater than Russia’s.
Ukraine had lost over 160 of its tanks and 25-30% of the vehicles supplied from abroad, he said, while Russia had lost 54 tanks. Ukraine said it has made gains in the counteroffensive.
Reuters could not independently verify statements from either side about the battlefield.
Putin further said Ukraine had deliberately hit the Kakhovka hydro-electric dam on June 6 with U.S.-supplied HIMARS rockets, a step he said had also hindered Kyiv’s counteroffensive efforts. Ukraine says Russia blew up the dam, which Russian forces captured early in the war.
Putin said Russia needed to fight enemy agents and improve its defences against attacks deep inside its own territory, but that there was no need to follow Ukraine’s example and declare martial law.
“There is no reason to introduce some kind of special regime or martial law in the country. There is no need for such a thing today.”
Reporting by Reuters; editing by Andrew Osborn, Gareth Jones and Mark Heinrich
As Moscow bureau chief, Guy runs coverage of Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States. Before Moscow, Guy ran Brexit coverage as London bureau chief (2012-2022). On the night of Brexit, his team delivered one of Reuters historic wins – reporting news of Brexit first to the world and the financial markets. Guy graduated from the London School of Economics and started his career as an intern at Bloomberg. He has spent over 14 years covering the former Soviet Union. He speaks fluent Russian.
Contact: +447825218698
June 13 (Reuters) – Russia’s Defence Ministry released video footage on Tuesday of what it said were German-made Leopard tanks and U.S.-made Bradley Fighting Vehicles captured by Russian forces in a fierce battle with Ukrainian troops.
Reuters was able to confirm that the vehicles seen in the video were Leopard tanks and Bradley Fighting Vehicles, but was not able to independently verify the location or date of the footage.
The Defence Ministry said the armoured vehicles and tanks were captured on the Zaporizhzhia front in southern Ukraine, one of the areas where Ukrainian forces have been trying to counter-attack.
Two Leopard tanks were shown in the footage, which was released on the ministry’s official channel on the Telegram messaging application, along with two damaged Bradley Fighting Vehicles.
A still image from a video, released by Russia’s Defence Ministry, shows what it said to be a German-made Leopard tank captured by Russian forces in a battle with Ukrainian forces in the course of Russia-Ukraine conflict, in the Zaporizhzhia region of Ukraine, in this image taken from a handout footage released June 13, 2023. Russian Defence Ministry/Handout via REUTERS
The ministry in a short statement accompanying the footage called the captured military hardware “our trophies” and said the video showed soldiers from its Vostok (East) military grouping inspecting the equipment.
It noted that the engines of some of the vehicles were still running, evidence it said of how quickly their Ukrainian crews had fled.
Reuters cannot verify such battlefield accounts.
Ukraine said on Monday its troops had recaptured a string of villages from Russian forces along an approximately 100-km (60-mile) front in the southeast since starting its long-anticipated counteroffensive last week.
Unconfirmed reports from Russian military bloggers suggest Russian forces may have recaptured some territory which they ceded in recent days.
Reporting by Andrew Osborn and Felix Light
Editing by Gareth Jones
At least 34 soldiers of NATO’s peacekeeping mission in Kosovo were injured during clashes with protesters in the northern part of the country Monday, according to the Italian defense ministry.
Tensions have risen in the past week after ethnically Albanian mayors took office in northern Kosovo, a majority Kosovo Serb area, following April elections that Kosovo Serbs had boycotted.
NATO’s Kosovo Force (KFOR) said the recent developments prompted them to increase their presence in northern Kosovo on Monday morning, which they later said turned violent.
The Italian defense ministry said 14 of its KFOR peacekeeping soldiers were injured when protesters threw “Molotov cocktails, with nails, firecrackers and stones inside.”
Hungarian and Moldovan soldiers were also among the injured peacekeeping troops, according to the Italian defense ministry.
“Italian and Hungarian KFOR contingent were the subject of unprovoked attacks and sustained trauma wounds with fractures and burns due to the explosion of incendiary devices,” it said, adding that KFOR medical units treated the soldiers.
Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni expressed her sympathy for the Italian KFOR soldiers injured in the clashes, adding in a statement, “What is happening is absolutely unacceptable and irresponsible. We will not tolerate further attacks on KFOR.”
Meanwhile, Nemanja Starović, Serbian State Secretary in the Ministry of Defence, offered a different version of events than what was outlined by NATO countries. He said “many” protesters were injured in the clashes and accused KFOR of using flash grenades when the “peaceful” protesters had “decided to disperse and continue the protest tomorrow morning.”
Kosovo, which is mainly ethnically Albanian, won independence from Serbia in 2008. But Serbia still considers Kosovo to be an integral part of its territory as do the Serbs living in northern Kosovo.
The NATO-led multi-national contingents had been deployed to four municipalities in the region to contain “violent demonstrations” as “newly elected mayors in recent days tried to take office,” KFOR said in a statement.
On Friday, Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić put the armed forces on the highest level of combat readiness. That decision followed Kosovo police clashing with protesters who tried to block a newly elected ethnic Albanian mayor from entering their office.
On Monday, barbed wire had been put around a municipal administration building in the municipality of Leposavić, with KFOR troops reported to be wearing anti-riot gear, CNN affiliate N1 reported. It added that Kosovo police special units erected a fence near the municipal administration building in the town of Zvecan.
Kosovo police say protesters had shown violence on Monday as they gathered in the municipalities of “Leposaviq, Zubin Potok and Zveqan.” Police added that in front of a facility in Zvecan, protesters had thrown tear gas and “tried to cross the security cordons to enter into the municipality facility by force.”
Serbian Prime Minister Ana Brnabić described KFOR’s increased presence in northern Kosovo on Monday as “belated” and said “the task of this international mission was to protect the interests and peace of the people in Kosovo and Metohija, not the usurpers.”
Brnabić said the situation in Kosovo and Metohija is “tense and difficult” and said, “It has never been more difficult.” Brnabić also expressed her “gratitude to Serbs in the province for remaining calm and refraining from violence.”
Meanwhile, the United States ambassador to Kosovo, Jeff Hovenier, condemned “violent actions” by protesters, citing the use of explosives.
The European Union Ambassador to Kosovo, Tomáš Szunyog, also condemned actions by protesters, citing damage to media vehicles.
Russia’s Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov, also spoke about the situation on Monday, describing it as a “large eruption is brewing up in the center of Europe.”
Correction: An earlier version of this story gave the wrong title for Nemanja Starović. He is the state secretary in Serbia’s Ministry of Defence.
OSLO, May 24 (Reuters) – The world’s largest aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald R. Ford, sailed into Oslo on Wednesday, a first for such a U.S. ship, in a show of NATO force at a time of heightened tension between NATO and Russia over the war in Ukraine.
The ship and its crew will be conducting training exercises with the Norwegian armed forces along the country’s coast in the coming days, the Norwegian military said.
“This visit is an important signal of the close bilateral relationship between the U.S. and Norway and a signal of the credibility of collective defence and deterrence,” said Jonny Karlsen, a spokesperson for the Norwegian Joint Headquarters, the operational command centre of the military.
At one spot on the Oslo fjord, dozens of people of all ages gathered on the shore to observe the vessel as it cruised by, taking pictures and videos.
Norwegian media reported the aircraft carrier would sail north of the Arctic Circle. Karlsen declined to comment on the reports.
The Russian embassy in Oslo condemned the aircraft carrier’s Oslo visit.
“There are no questions in the (Arctic) north that require a military solution, nor topics where outside intervention is needed,” the embassy said in a Facebook post.
“Considering that it is admitted in Oslo that Russia poses no direct military threat to Norway, such demonstrations of power appear illogical and harmful.”
NATO member Norway shares a border with Russia in the Arctic and last year became Europe’s largest gas supplier after a drop in Russian gas flows.
The Norwegian military and NATO allies have been patrolling around offshore oil and gas platforms since the autumn, following explosions on the Nord Stream pipelines in the Baltic Sea.
Reporting by Gwladys Fouche
Editing by Bernadette Baum
Oversees news coverage from Norway for Reuters and loves flying to Svalbard in the Arctic, oil platforms in the North Sea, and guessing who is going to win the Nobel Peace Prize. Born in France and with Reuters since 2010, she has worked for The Guardian, Agence France-Presse and Al Jazeera English, among others, and speaks four languages.
NATO on Tuesday deployed additional forces to Kosovo, a day after peacekeeping troops were injured in clashes with Serb protesters in the country.
11 Italian and 19 Hungarian soldiers belonging to Kosovo Force (KFOR), a NATO-led peacekeeping mission, were wounded in northern Kosovo while working to contain violent demonstrations. Three of the Hungarian soldiers were injured by the use of firearms, according to KFOR.
NATO condemned the attacks and called “on all sides to refrain from actions that further inflame tensions, and to engage in dialogue.”
In a tweet Tuesday afternoon, Allied Joint Force Command Naples said NATO is sending the Operational Reserve Forces (ORF) for the Western Balkans to Kosovo.
“JFC Naples is closely monitoring the situation in Kosovo, and will continue to coordinate with KFOR to ensure that they have all the capabilities and forces they need to impartially ensure a safe and secure environment and the freedom of movement for all communities,” it said, noting that additional reserve forces have been ordered to boost readiness to reinforce KFOR if needed.
Admiral Stuart B. Munsch, commander of Allied Joint Force Command Naples, said in a statement that “the deployment of additional NATO forces to Kosovo is a prudent measure to ensure that KFOR has the capabilities it needs to maintain security in accordance with our U.N. Security Council Mandate.”
“I want to commend KFOR for taking swift, restrained, and professional action to intervene to stop the unrest and to save lives,” he said, adding: “The violence must stop, and all sides must stop taking actions to undermine the peace in any and all communities of Kosovo.”
Tensions are running high in the region. On Friday, the U.S., France, Italy, Germany, and the U.K. issued a joint statement condemning Kosovo’s decision to force access to municipal buildings in northern Kosovo. The five countries also said they are “concerned by Serbia’s decision to raise the level of readiness of its Armed Forces at the border with Kosovo and call all parties for maximum restraint, avoiding inflammatory rhetoric.”
Istanbul — Turkey will hold national elections on Sunday that look set to be the toughest test of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s long political career. After ruling the country for two decades, polls showed Erdogan neck-and-neck with rival Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the candidate fielded jointly by the opposition Nation’s Alliance.
Erdogan was applauded during his first decade as leader for transforming Turkey into an economic and political success story, but over the last 10 years he’s faced mounting criticism — both domestically and internationally — for quashing dissent and adopting rules and laws typical of autocratic regimes.
Once a poster child for developing nations, Turkey is also currently battling high inflation and a cost-of-living crisis, both of which are regularly blamed by opponents and economists on Erdogan’s unorthodox economic policies.
Erdogan’s chief rival, KiIicdaroglu, is a secular social democrat politician who has emphasized messages of freedom and democracy on the campaign trail. The opposition alliance he represents has promised to roll back constitutional changes introduced after a 2017 referendum that significantly expanded the powers of the presidency, and to bring back the parliamentary system.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan addresses supporters at the AK Party’s “Great Istanbul Rally” on May 7, 2023, in Istanbul, Turkey, ahead of the May 14 election.
Ercan Arslan /dia images via Getty Images
To win the election outright a candidate must secure more than 50% of the votes. Polling suggests that’s unlikely, so the nail-biting race between the two leading candidates could easily carry on to a second round of runoff voting, which would be held on May 28.
Below is a look at why Turkey’s national elections will be followed closely around the world.
NATO expansion
Turkey is a member of the NATO military alliance, and it has the second-largest army among all 31 members, behind only the U.S. But relations between Ankara and its NATO partners haven’t always been smooth.
Last year, Erdogan frustrated his allies by blocking Sweden and Finland’s bids to join the alliance, which were prompted directly by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Although Turkey lifted its block on Finland’s accession last month, allowing the country to join, talks with Sweden fell through.
Erdogan argues that Sweden doesn’t take Turkey’s domestic security concerns seriously and provides refuge to militants from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, a banned group that’s fighting an insurgency against the Turkish state.
Unal Cevikoz, a senior aide on foreign affairs to Erdogan’s challenger Kilicdaroglu, told CBS News the opposition alliance has noted “positive steps” taken by Sweden concerning Turkey’s security concerns, and it hopes the Nordic nation’s NATO membership won’t be delayed “too much,” signaling support for the Swedish accession bid.
Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the leader of the Republican People’s Party (CHP) and the joint presidential candidate of the Nation Alliance, attends a campaign rally in Aydin, Turkey, on May 10, 2023.
Omer Evren Atalay/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
Turkey-U.S. ties
Located on the very border between the Eastern and Western worlds, Turkey is a strategically significant ally and partner for the U.S. unilaterally as well as in the context of NATO.
Relations between the two countries spiraled downward after Turkey purchased S-400 long-range missile systems from Russia in 2019, however, and there have been other points of contention.
The U.S. said the missile purchase would endanger American military technology, and hit Turkey with sanctions in response.
Another sore point is Muhammed Fethullah Gülen. The Turkish dissident has lived in exile in the U.S. for years. Turkey alleges that his organization, which it also considers a terrorist group, was behind a 2016 coup attempt and has long demanded that the U.S. hand him over.
But despite the differences, Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), has pledged to strengthen ties with the U.S. and ensure tangible steps are taken to resolve all the disputes.
In an interview with the BBC, Kilicdaroglu said he wants to prioritize relations with the West, rather than Russia.
Turkey as a mediator, and ties with Russia
Erdogan has cultivated a close personal relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Not long after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the Turkish leader declared himself a mediator.
Initial talks hosted in Turkey failed to make any headway, but a deal brokered by the United Nations in 2022 and supervised by Turkey has enabled the export of some 25 million tons of grain from Ukrainian ports to ease a global food crisis. That deal is set to expire in about a week, and Russia has so far objected to its renewal. Turkey remains directly involved in the extremely tense negotiations over the agreement’s renewal.
Erdogan has refused to implement Western sanctions against Russia, and trade between the two countries has soared since the Ukraine invasion. Turkey is an energy-poor country, and it helps export Russian gas around the world. Russia is also funding and building Turkey’s first nuclear power plant.
Cevikoz, the aide to Erodgan’s challenger, said the opposition alliance did not “approve” of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and, if their candidate wins, they would “continue to facilitate” solutions for the problems between Russia and Ukraine.
Turkey’s role in the region
Erdogan’s ambitious foreign policy has made Turkey a key player in the Middle East.
Turkey openly supported some of the rebel factions that battled Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s forces, and it has provided safe haven for Syrian opposition members. But Turkey also occupied portions of northwest Syria in 2019, citing security concerns from Kurdish rebel factions, and still controls a vast area of land where 4.5 million people live.
Turkey currently has the world’s largest refugee population, with some 4 million displaced people living in the country. Most are Syrians, though there are also large number of Iraqis, Iranians and Afghans. The high numbers and Turkey’s geographic location have made the country a de-facto gatekeeper for the European Union: Ankara signed a deal with the EU to limit the number of asylum seekers reaching European soil.
But a shift in public opinion on refugees, including rising populist rhetoric against them, prompted Erdogan to take steps towards reconciliation with the Assad regime in Syria.
Turkey’s political opposition has vowed to facilitate the return of refugees to Syria if it comes to power, but it has not provided details on how they would do it.
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