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The accession to the North Atlantic Alliance has brought Romania the most solid security guarantee in the country's history, as a member of the strongest political-military alliance in the world, Defence Minister Vasile Dincu said.
"The accession, 18 years ago, to the North Atlantic Alliance has brought Romania the most solid security guarantee in the country's history. We are today members of the strongest political-military alliance in the world, which is particularly important in the current security context. As a community based on values such as liberty, democracy and rule of law, NATO has generated profound transformations in the Romanian society. Thus, April 2004 stays in the country's history as the moment when the Romanian flag was hoisted for the first time at the NATO headquarters, the moment when Romanians understood the collective defence concept within the founding treaty of the Alliance: "All for one, one for all!," Vasile Dincu said in Cluj on Sunday at the ceremony devoted to NATO Day.
According to him, this expression is so much more significant in the current period, when we see every day the effects of a ruthless war taking place so close to Romania's borders.
"The accession to NATO has brought about important changes on the level of the military body as well. We have today a professional, experienced army, which has exercised its capacities in missions in the theatres of operations. Moreover, the Romanian troops are operating today based on modern procedures and concepts of conducting military actions, which are kept at an optimal interoperability level, through a great number of exercises and applications organised in the allied format. Ever since the Russian Federation invaded Crimea in 2014, Romania has sustained the geostrategic importance for NATO of the extended Black Sea region, constantly proposing measures to strengthen the Eastern Flank. And the Alliance has favourably responded each time, therefore today we benefit in Romania of a complete and permanent security architecture, starting from the South-Easte Multinational Brigade in Craiova, continuing with the South-East Multinational Division in Bucharest and ending with the South-East Multinational Corps in Sibiu," the Defence Minister added.
Dincu reiterated that Romania needed credible military capabilities, with a proper endowment and well trained military.
"NATO can further count on Romania in the common efforts to develop the strategic defence. At the same time, NATO represents for Romania the strongest guarantee of security that we can count on in times as, unfortunately, we are living now. NATO is Romania, Romania is NATO!," Dincu concluded.
The National Defence Minister participated on Sunday in the military ceremony that took place at the headquarters of the 4th Gemina Infantry Division in Cluj-Napoca, on the occasion of NATO Day.
