V4 to contribute company of soldiers to Baltics mission, says ministry

Budapest, June 14 (MTI) – Countries in the Visegrád Group (V4) will add a company of soldiers to NATO’s mission in the Baltics, the Hungarian defence ministry said in a statement on Tuesday. 

The statement said that the security of NATO members in the Baltics has considerably worsened in wake of the Ukraine crisis. In such a situation “federal solidarity is extremely important”, and Visegrád countries want to make a tangible contribution to efforts aimed at ensuring the security of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, the statement said.

Czech, Polish, Hungarian, and Slovak units will take three-month turns and will hold joint exercises with local forces, the statement said.

On the sidelines of a meeting of NATO defence ministers under way in Brussels, István Simicskó, Hungary’s defence minister, agreed with his V4 counterparts to jointly improve military capabilities in future. Relevant plans include multinational exercises to improve cooperative skills, the statement said.

Source: http://mtva.hu/hu/hungary-matters