NATO member Ministers endorse €1 bn Innovation Fund to enhance defence technologies

The Defence Ministers from 17 Allied countries agreed to take the lead on the development of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation’s (NATO) first Innovation Fund. The plan was endorsed on Friday during the signing ceremony hosted by NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg at Brussels Summit, the multinational organisation said in a statement. The 17 member nations include Belgium, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia and the United Kingdom.

The expansion plan is to ensure NATO "continues to have right forces at the right place at the right time," Xinhua quoted Secretary-General Stoltenberg as saying at the ministerial meeting on Thursday. This multinational Fund will help NATO retain its technological edge by enabling investment – worth 1 billion euros - in dual-use technologies of potential application to defence and security, NATO said in a statement. Additionally, the fund is also expected to facilitate closer and "trusted cooperation" with deep-tech innovators, who may otherwise be unable to develop successfully the innovative solutions most needed for the protection of the Alliance.

“At the Brussels Summit, NATO leaders committed to strengthening our Alliance, including by promoting and protecting transatlantic innovation”, the Secretary-General said at the ceremony.

With the first Innovation Fund, NATO’s Defence Innovation Accelerator for the North Atlantic – or DIANA - the Innovation Fund will support the development of a protected transatlantic innovation community, NATO said. "Since its launch at NATO’s Brussels Summit, several allies have made offers to host the headquarters, test centres and accelerator sites that will make the DIANA network in both Europe and North America," it added. Both initiatives are expected to be fully in effect by NATO’s Madrid Summit in 2022. Meanwhile, referring to the ongoing spat between NATO members (France and Germany over Europe) and Russia's sudden exit from the international military alliance, Secretary General Stoltenberg looked forward to "making important progress" on how to work more closely on technology and the fund.

Russia suspends NATO mission

In a retaliatory move to counter the expulsion of eight members of the Russian military alliance, Moscow on October 18 announced disengagement with the intergovernmental military alliance saying that the NATO Mission in Moscow would be stripped of their accreditation from November 1.

It is to be noted that NATO had suspended practical operations with Russian in 2014 after it annexed Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula. As per Guardian, although, NATO kept channels open for high-level military talks, both the parties had only met "sporadically."

Image: @JensStoltenberg_Twitter