BERLIN, December 11. /TASS/. NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, speaking at a forum in Germany, called on Europeans to prepare for a war that their "grandparents and great-grandparents" had experienced.
"Conflict is at our door. <…> We must be prepared for the scale of war our grandparents and great-grandparents endured," Rutte said, speaking in Berlin at the invitation of the organizers of the Munich Security Conference. He also urged NATO countries to increase their defense spending.
Previously, President Vladimir Putin stated that Russia is ready to confirm in any way that it does not intend to attack European countries. According to the Russian leader, politicians who publicly claim otherwise are either "out of their minds" or "crooks," and such statements are "complete nonsense" and "outright lies." Speaking at the 80th UN General Assembly's General Debate, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov emphasized that Russia has never had any intention of attacking NATO or the EU.