All news

China to become NATO’s second main enemy after Russia in next 10 years, report says

The report notes the necessity to reform the Alliance, establishing a number of specialized structures, to counteract challenges coming from Beijing

BRUSSELS, December 1. /TASS/. NATO experts have prepared the NATO 2030 - United for a New Era report, which claims that in the upcoming 10 years, China will become the second-worst enemy of the Alliance after Russia, and that the bloc must be urgently reformed in order to counteract it, establishing a number of specialized structures, a source in Brussels told TASS Tuesday.

"According to the NATO 2030 report, which Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg will present at the NATO Foreign Ministers’ video conference Tuesday, in the upcoming decade, the Alliance must concentrate, besides the response to traditional threats [deterrence of Russia and humanitarian interventions], on countering challenges coming from China. The report recommends establishing special structures, which must guarantee NATO’s technical dominance over China and protect the member states from China establishing an economic control over their strategic sectors of economy," the source said.

"The authors also recommend including China and measures for countering it in a new edition of the NATO Strategic Concept."

The report also "notes the necessity to prevent China from establishing control over the key commodity sources, including new-generation ones, in the third countries, in Africa in particular."

Lithium is considered one of such "resources of the future." It is a key resource for production of rechargeable batteries, necessary for efficient use of alternative energy sources, which the European countries currently actively promote.

Stoltenberg announced the presentation of the NATO 2030 report Monday, adding that the report’s final version would be presented at the 2021 NATO summit in Brussels. He also stated that China is a new challenge for NATO, because it invests heavily in development of new weapons, does not share the NATO values and creeps up on the alliance, from the Arctic to Africa.