Viola Amherd meets NATO General Stoltenberg in Brussels

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A meeting with Stoltenberg, secretary general of the NATO defense alliance, was originally scheduled for November 2021, but had to be postponed. After the talks with Stoltenberg on Wednesday, the Federal Council is then expected in the NATO Council.

With the outbreak of war in Ukraine, the meeting may have taken on a new focus. The supplementary report to the Security Policy Report 2021, published in September last year, gives an idea of ​​what it could be about.

cooperation with NATO

Switzerland’s cooperation with the defense alliance, which has existed since 1996, is already well established, “it could be developed further on this basis or taken to a qualitatively new level,” it says.

This should mean NATO’s recently launched “Individual Partnership and Cooperation Programme” (ITPP), which aims to further develop cooperation with its individual partner states and make coordination more flexible. Talks are currently underway between Switzerland and NATO.

The supplementary report states: “This increases the range and is in Switzerland’s interest. It can waive previous self-imposed restrictions without violating neutrality.”

The report said that consideration should be given to a possible participation of the Swiss military in NATO exercises, increased cooperation in cyber, civil protection and “resilience of critical infrastructures and services”.

Swiss advocate rapprochement

The image of the transatlantic defense alliance among the Swiss population also seems to have changed recently. By January 2023, 55 percent would have agreed to a NATO rapprochement.

This is the conclusion of the “Security 2023” study, published last Thursday by the Federal Government by the Military Academy (MILAK) at ETH Zurich and the Center for Security Studies (CSS) at ETH Zurich. This means that “for the first time a narrow majority of the Swiss are in favor of a rapprochement with NATO”.

In addition, 53 percent believe that neutrality “enables Switzerland to plan military defenses together with NATO,” it said. Accession to NATO, on the other hand, is rejected by the majority of those surveyed: only a third were in favor of accession.

Amherd is expected in Brussels on Monday evening – for a meal with ministers. The Schuman Forum, organized by the EU, will then take place on Tuesday and Wednesday in the EU Parliament in Brussels.

Meeting with the Belgian Chief of Defense

Given the geopolitical situation, the EU is ready to “strengthen security and stability,” the forum program said. Cooperation with partners is central.

Ministers from all five continents, military representatives, civil society representatives, think tank representatives and more are invited. Various discussion panels and workshops are planned.

Also on Amherd’s agenda is a bilateral meeting with Belgian Defense Minister Ludivine Dedonder. Swiss neutrality and discussions of the War Material Act are likely to be topics in their various conversations.

The defense minister himself recently told Swiss officers that it was not understood abroad that Switzerland was preventing other countries from “supplying Ukraine with urgently needed weapons and ammunition”. A comment that earned her criticism. (SDA)

Source:Blick