“We are members of NATO. I have no doubt about security guarantees provided by our organizations, our NATO. The summit in Newport was really successful. As minister of foreign affairs, as former minister of defence, I am really well-informed, measures taken are serious,” Linkevičius told journalist Richard Quest when asked to specify whether Russia constituted a threat to the Baltic states.
“But our people are nervous, sometimes uncertain and they need some more insurance because of the situation around,” the minister said in an interview published on Friday.
In response to the Russian actions in Ukraine, NATO this year stepped up the Baltic air-policing mission and patrol of the Baltic Sea, the US has sent companies of troops to each of the Baltic states and Poland, with more intensive exercises held in the region. On the other hand, the Alliance maintains it will stick to the 1997 treaty with Moscow, which stipulates that considerable combat capacities should not be stationed in new member-states.
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