NATO opens new military training center in Ukraine

NATO plans to create a center for the training and education of Ukrainian military personnel, El País reports, citing its own sources. According to her, the new project, which will complement the mission of the European Union and the programs of some Western countries, is designed to help Kyiv not only in training its soldiers and military personnel, but also to teach them strategy and defense administration. The goal is to build support for Ukraine and help bring its forces up to NATO standards. Alliance members are now finalizing the details of the program. According to the publication, so far NATO has avoided steps that Russia could interpret as a threat. However, the new center represents a change in philosophy in this sense, the newspaper notes. Now NATO allies are debating how the initiative will be funded and what type of trainers should be involved. Alliance defense ministers, who meet on February 14 and 15 in Brussels, expect to prepare details of the project, which is expected to receive final approval at the organization's summit in Washington in July. A number of NATO countries, including Spain, are already running military training programs for Ukrainian soldiers. Under the new initiative, the center, which Poland has proposed to serve as a base, will provide more extensive training than what alliance allies offer. Yesterday, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, during his speech before the meeting of NATO defense ministers in Brussels, spoke of “the continued possible threat of combined attacks” and added: “We do not see an immediate military threat to any of the allied countries. But there is an ongoing risk of hybrid attacks, including cyber attacks and other hybrid activities against allies.” To counter these threats, NATO is now conducting exercises, information sharing between countries and cooperation with the civilian sector, Stoltenberg said. He also added: “We continue to monitor the situation on the borders of the countries of this alliance with Russia in order to be able to respond to any challenge from Russia.”