(VOVWORLD) -NATO members have agreed to spend a minimum of 2% of their national output on defense, NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg said Tuesday at the NATO summit being held in Vilnius, Lithuania.
 NATO summit in Vilnius, Lithuania (Photo: AFP/VNA) |
11 allies made an enduring commitment to invest at least 2% of gross domestic product annually on defense. They expect this number will rise substantially next year.
Last year, only eight NATO countries met the 2% target, including Greece, the US, Lithuania, Poland, the UK, Croatia, Estonia and Latvia.
This year, NATO forecasts the largest growth in Poland at 3.9%. Three countries that can meet the 2% target are Slovakia, Finland, and Romania. NATO also forecasts that Germany will increase defense spending to 1.59% of GDP this year. Meanwhile, Belgium, Turkey, Italy, Croatia, the UK and Greece will decrease their military budget.
The NATO summit discussed Ukraine’s accession and NATO’s cooperative expansion with Australia, Japan, New Zealand and South Korea, also known as Asia-Pacific Partnership Group – AP4.
The summit released a joint statement affirming the Indo-Pacific region plays an important role for NATO because developments in this region can directly affect the security of the Europe and the Atlantic Ocean.