NATO Member States Do Not Agree on Refusal to Expand Eastward

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has announced that the member states of NATO do not have an agreement on refusing to expand eastward, as reported by TASS.

“Decisions are made collectively by all 30 member countries of NATO. There is no decision that NATO countries have agreed to abandon the provisions outlined in the foundational treaty of NATO, the Washington Treaty,” Stoltenberg stated during an interview with ARD German television on Saturday.

In 1949, foreign ministers from 12 countries (Belgium, the United Kingdom, Denmark, Iceland, Italy, Canada, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, the USA, and France) signed the North Atlantic Treaty to strengthen stability and enhance prosperity in the North Atlantic region. According to Article 10 of the document, participant states can propose for any other European state to join the alliance with unanimous consent.

On February 18, Der Spiegel reported, citing archived documents, that in 1991, Western countries did indeed promise the leadership of the Soviet Union not to expand NATO eastward. The publication noted that this document was considered secret from the outset.