BRUSSELS, Feb. 13 (Xinhua) — The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) must “increase production” of munitions as Ukraine’s rate of use is depleting current capabilities and draining stockpiles, the alliance’s Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said Monday.
The conflict in Ukraine is “consuming a huge amount of ammunition and depleting allied stocks,” he told reporters ahead of a meeting of NATO defense ministers.
“The current rate of Ukraine’s munitions spending is many times higher than our current rate of production. This puts our defense industry under strain,” he said.
Stoltenberg said the current waiting period for large-caliber ammunition has increased from 12 months to 28 months.
“Orders placed today will only be delivered two and a half years later. So we need to increase production and invest in our production capacity,” he said.
On Tuesday, the ministers will discuss Ukraine’s request for more weapons.
Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov will join them both for the US-led Contact Group for Ukraine and for the NATO Ministerial Meeting.
Stoltenberg said the alliance has decided to establish a new coordination cell at NATO headquarters to support its efforts to prevent and counter threats to critical infrastructure, including underwater cables and pipelines.
The US Navy has been accused in press reports of involvement in the attacks last September against the Nord Stream gas pipelines in the Swedish and Danish exclusive economic zones under the Baltic Sea, which were built to transport natural gas from Russia to Germany.
American investigative journalist Seymour Hersh claimed in recent days that US Navy divers detonated explosives under the pipelines during NATO’s Baltic Operations 2022 exercise.
Source: sn.dk