COVID-19 should not become a security crisis, warns NATO chief in an interview

Read the full transcript here:

Mr. Secretary General, you called COVID-19 a "common invisible enemy". What efforts are made to coordinate the joint response between the EU and NATO to tackle the crisis?

We are working closely with the European Union - NATO and the European Union are complementing each other. We will have a NATO defence ministerial meeting using secure video conference, where HRVP Josep Borrell will participate. I am also staying in close contact with President Ursula von der Leyen, President Charles Michel and we also coordinate on staff level. NATO and the EU are coordinating closely in combating COVID-19.

What long-term lessons could NATO learn from the pandemic when it comes to preparedness for bacteriological warfare or CBRM threats?

NATO is an organisation which has always prepared for crisis and which has developed capabilities that can be deployed in response to armed attack and to military threats. What we see now is that these capabilities are also very useful in supporting the civilian efforts in fighting a health crisis, the coronavirus crisis, because you've seen how NATO can use our command structure, use different NATO mechanisms to make sure that we can lift a lot of equipment from around the globe into Europe to transport for instance, protective suits or medical equipment to help Allies cope with a corona crisis. We have field hospitals which are transported and have been set up in helping Allies dealing with the crisis. Medical evacuation, which is something we have developed over the years and which is something we have used for instance in Afghanistan transporting heavily wounded or seriously wounded soldiers, we now use the same tools, the same skills to transport infected people in Europe to hospitals where they can get the treatment. So military personnel, the national level, NATO, NATO command structure, NATO capabilities, and strategic airlift are being now used to a large extent providing significant support to NATO allies in fighting COVID-19.

In December, NATO decided to focus stronger on a rising China. In the recent weeks, we have seen something dubbed 'mask diplomacy' by the Chinese in Europe, but also some Russian efforts. Is this a reason of concern to NATO?

We have to take seriously any attempt to utilise the health crisis to convey false narratives, disinformation and propaganda. I believe that the best response to propaganda is not propaganda. I believe that the best response to propaganda is the truth, are facts. And therefore, that's exactly what we do. We are transparent and we provide the facts about what we do as NATO allies. But fundamentally, I believe that the best response we have to disinformation is a free and independent press. Journalists asking the difficult questions, journalists checking their sources. That's the best way to make sure that those who are trying to convey disinformation campaigns don't succeed. And NATO's core task is to protect those democratic values that enable free press to operate.

During the last NATO ministerial you also mentioned threats that could go unnoticed while the world focuses on the pandemic. What are you most worried about?

What we see now, we all are focused now, and of course NATO too, on the imminent challenges the corona crisis poses to us and NATO to help our allies in responding. At the same time, we know that the threats and the challenges that were there before the COVID-19 crisis, they have not disappeared. They are still there. The terrorist threat, the instability in the Middle East, Syria, North Africa, cyber threats, but also the challenges posed by a shifting global balance of power with the rise of China, or a more assertive Russia, which is responsible for a continuous violation of the sovereignty of Ukraine and Georgia, two European nations. The reality is that yes, of course, we have to deal with COVID-19, but at the same time, we have to make sure that the health crisis doesn't become a security crisis. So therefore, NATO has to help dealing with the COVID-19 crisis, but at the same time, we need to maintain our missions and operations and our readiness. That's the reason why we sustain our battlegroups in the Eastern part of the Alliance and the Baltic countries, while we continue to do air policing and while we continue to fight international terrorism, with our mission in Afghanistan or help to stabilise the Western Balkans with our mission in Kosovo. We need both at the same time: fight COVID-19, but also address the other threats and challenges, which we are facing.

Europe might face a severe recession after the pandemic. Will NATO be willing to reconsider the national contributions to the 2% defence spending target?

I think we all now are focused on how to save lives and that's the main task. Then we all understand that there will be some severe economic consequences over the COVID-19 crisis and how severe those will be depends also on how long this will last. I think what we have seen is partly that the threats, which we are faced with haven't disappeared, because of the COVID-19 crisis and we partly also see that military capabilities like airlift, like military medicine, like logistics, transportation - they are all relevant in dealing with a health crisis. So investing in the military is not only relevant for responding to a military threat, but investing in military provides the civil society with a surged capability that can be utilised in crisis like these and that's exactly what NATO allies are doing, because we see military personnel helping the health workers on the frontline all the time. What we also need to do is to understand the importance of resilience, that everything we can do to make our societies more resilient, will help us be prepared for the next crisis. And resilience is a core task for NATO. It's actually something which is enshrined in NATO's founding treaty, saying that we have a responsibility for making our Allies resilient also against, for instance, health threats.