The appointment of Jens Stoltenberg will turn the high-profile event into the US-led bloc\u2019s \u201cfiefdom,\u201d a Russian presidential envoy has said<\/p>\n
Former NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg will become the co-chair of the Munich Security Conference (MSC) together with the former head of the OSCE, Helga Maria Schmid, the organizers have said.
\nThe conference, which has been held annually in Germany\u2019s third-largest city since 1963, is considered one of the leading Western platforms for security policy and geopolitical debate. It was at the MSC that Russian President Vladimir Putin delivered his famous 2007 speech, criticizing the unipolar world order and NATO\u2019s eastward expansion. Representatives from Moscow were last invited to the gathering in 2022.
\nThe Russian presidential investment envoy, Kirill Dmitriev, reacted to the appointment of Stoltenberg and Schmid in a post on X on Tuesday, saying that \u201cinstead of striving to become a much-needed neutral solution space for global security, the Munich Security Conference reinforces its position as a NATO fiefdom.\u201d
\nIn a statement on the Munich Security Conference website on Monday, Stoltenberg said he was pleased to become one of the co-chairs of the conference and thanked the MSC Foundation Council for \u201cthis vote of confidence.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Read more<\/p>\n
I cannot \u2018promise\u2019 the US will remain in NATO \u2013 Stoltenberg<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m really looking forward to sharing this post with Helga, with whom I\u2019ve already collaborated with excellently in our previous roles at NATO, the EU, and the OSCE,\u201d he said.
\nThe Norwegian politician, who served as NATO secretary-general between 2014 and 2024, was expected to be appointed the sole chairman of the MSC in early 2025. However, Stoltenberg postponed taking up the role repeatedly due to becoming his country\u2019s finance minister around the same time. Becoming a co-chair should allow him to combine his work in the government in Oslo with his duties at the MSC.
\nStoltenberg took up the reins at NATO several months after the violent Western-backed coup in Kiev in 2014, which led to the overthrow of democratically-elected Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich. The US-led bloc continued its eastward expansion under his leadership, with Montenegro, North Macedonia, Finland, and Sweden joining it between 2017 and 2024. NATO also continued to increase its military buildup near Russian borders and boosted ties with the new authorities in Kiev, despite repeated protests and warnings by Russia.
\nAfter the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in February 2022, which was largely provoked by Kiev\u2019s aspirations of becoming a NATO member, Stoltenberg consistently advocated for more Western military aid to Vladimir Zelensky\u2019s government, while also calling a Russian victory the \u201cbiggest cost and the greatest risk\u201d for the bloc.<\/p>\n
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In 2024, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova called the NATO chief an \u201cirresponsible\u201d person, who failed to grasp the consequences of his actions, after he supported the use of long-range foreign-supplied weapons by Ukraine for strikes deep into Russian territory. Putin reacted to his words by saying that he remembered the times when Stoltenberg \u201cdidn\u2019t suffer from dementia.\u201d
\nSchmid, who was secretary-general of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe between 2020 and 2024, said she was delighted to contribute her \u201cexperience in European diplomacy and international negotiations\u201d to the work of the Munich Security Conference.
\nDuring Schmid\u2019s tenure, Moscow repeatedly accused the OSCE of being hijacked by its NATO and EU members to advance Western interests at the expense of other members. Earlier this year, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Aleksandr Grushko said the organization was effectively turned into an instrument of \u201chybrid war and coercion\u201d against sovereign states, who are \u201csubjected to threats, blackmail\u201d for simply pursuing their national interests.<\/p>\n
READ MORE: NATO officer removed over \u2018rumors\u2019 Soviet-born girlfriend was a spy \u2013 Telegraph<\/p>\n
The outgoing MSC chairman, Wolfgang Ischinger, who has been in charge for two decades, will hand over his duties to Stoltenberg and Schmid sometime before February 2027 when the next conference is scheduled to be held.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The appointment of Jens Stoltenberg will turn the high-profile event into the US-led bloc\u2019s \u201cfiefdom,\u201d a Russian presidential envoy has said Former NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg will become the co-chair…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":38180,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38179","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economy","category-environment","category-politics"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t