NATO’s chief said the alliance does not want a “new Cold War” with Russia, despite members’ concerns about the Russian military buildup close to NATO’s border.
Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg spoke at the end of a four-day NATO parliamentary assembly in the Romanian capital.
“We are concerned by […Russia’s] lack of transparency when it comes to military exercises,” he said.
He mentioned a Russian-Belarus operation in September involving thousands of troops, tanks and aircraft held in Belarus, on NATO’s eastern edge. The drills included maneuvers designed to hunt down and destroy armed spies.
Still, Stoltenberg said: “Russia is our neighbor […] we don’t want to isolate Russia. We don’t want a new Cold War.”
He said the 29-member alliance had increased jets patrols in the Black Sea in “response to Russia’s aggressive actions in Ukraine.”
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