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Romania hosting B9 summit meeting
Bucharest 9 (B9) heads of State - Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Hungary - are convening today at the Cotroceni Presidential Palace in Bucharest for a summit hosted by President Klaus Iohannis and his Polish counterpart Andrzej Duda as initiators of this format.
The meeting will be attended virtually by NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. He had initially announced his in-person presence in Bucharest, but on Thursday, the Reuters news agency citing a NATO official, reported that Jens Stoltenberg had been diagnosed with shingles and would only participate remotely in the events he was invited to attend in Germany and Romania.
According to the official schedule, the official reception of the attending heads of state starts at 14:40hrs in the Hall of Honour of the Cotroceni Presidential Palace, followed at 14:55 by a photo op in the Union Hall.
Addressing the the opening of the plenary session of the summit, scheduled for 15:00hrs, will be President of Romania Klaus Iohannis, and Poland's President Andrzej Duda.
A joint news conference of the two presidents follows at 17:15hrs.
According to the Romanian Presidential Administration, the summit meeting of the Bucharest 9 format is of particular importance, especially amid the ongoing security context generated by Russia's unjustified and unprovoked aggression against Ukraine and the common and multidimensional challenges facing the NATO member states on the eastern flank, as well as the entire Euro-Atlantic region.
The meeting also prepares the most important decisions for a NATO summit to be held in Madrid on June 28-30, and will address as a matter of priority the consequences of Russia's unprovoked military aggression against Ukraine, and NATO's response to it.
Iohannis will underscore the need to strengthen the NATO's deterrence and defence posture on the eastern flank, in a balanced and unitary manner, from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea.
The Romanian head of state will also point out that the most important outcome of the Madrid Summit is the new Strategic Concept, which will define NATO guidelines for at least the next decade, a document that must be ambitious and anchored in the reality of which is marked by Russia's war against Ukraine. Romania, he will say, aims for the adoption of a Strategic Concept that prioritises collective defence, defines Russia as a threat to NATO and strengthens the alliance at all levels in order to meet all present and future challenges.
Also addressed in high-level discussions will be continued support for increasing the resilience of Ukraine and its Eastern Neighborhood partners to the threats and challenges they face, as well as NATO's "open door" policy, including the accession of Finland and Sweden.
The Bucharest 9 format is an initiative launched President Klaus Iohannis and President Andrzej Duda with the participation of NATO member states on the eastern flank: Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Hungary. B9 is said to be a particularly useful platform for effective coordination and consultation of NATO's eastern flank member states as well as at a transatlantic level.
The first B9 summit meeting was organised in Bucharest in November 2015.