NATO Secretary-General, Jens Stoltenberg, says he expects members of the defence alliance to increase their military spending target of at least two per cent of gross domestic product, GDP.
He made this known in media comments published on Wednesday.
“I expect that there will be a new target in defence spending when we meet in July this year for the NATO summit in Vilnius,’’ the Norwegian told the German newspaper Die Welt.
He recalled that the target to increase spending to two per cent of the respective national GDP was decided in 2014 for a period of 10 years.
“So we have to update it now,’’ he said.
In view of Russia’s war against Ukraine, Stoltenberg left open what future target member states could concretely agree on.
“But I assume that it will be a more ambitious target than before because everybody sees that we have to invest more.’’
In this context, the NATO chief also mentioned the German government’s special budget of 100 billion euros (109 billion dollars) for the German armed forces.
The Bundeswehr currently said Germany was one of several alliance members that did not meet the two per cent target.
dpa/NAN
