German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier has indicated his opposition to a push by the United States to speed up Ukraine and Georgia's membership of NATO.
Speaking in the German parliament, or Bundestag, on Wednesday, Steinmeier said that there was "no reason now, seven months after the NATO summit, to go beyond the decisions made in Bucharest." At that meeting in April, France and Germany prevented the Western military alliance from offering the two former Soviet states the Membership Action Plan which would have put them on track to eventual membership.
The two countries were, however, assured that they would one day be included in NATO, much to the fury of Russia, which perceives such a move as proof that the alliance is encroaching on its traditional sphere of influence. The European reluctance to rush ahead with including the two states has, if anything, increased in the light of Georgia's war with Russia in August.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,592968,00.html
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore