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Germany ups investment in NATO battalion in Lithuania by Staff Writers Vilnius (AFP) Feb 4, 2019 Germany will invest 110 million euros (US$127 million) in military infrastructure in Lithuania until 2021, its defence minister said Monday, on a visit to mark two years since NATO installed battalions in the Baltic region to ward off Russia. In 2017, NATO deployed four multinational battalions to Poland and the Baltic states as a counter against possible Russian action following its 2014 annexation of Crimea from Ukraine. Germany leads the NATO battalion in Lithuania comprising 1,200 troops from 10 countries. "We're going to invest in the long-term engagement," Ursula von der Leyen told reporters, adding that Berlin would invest in "common barracks and training fields" in Lithuania until 2021. Lithuania's defence minister Raimundas Karoblis hailed Germany's spending plans as evidence of commitment to the NATO deployment. "We have heard very officially, very clearly at the political level.. that Germany is for the long run here and will stay here as long as the security situation will demand it," Karoblis said. The other three NATO battalions deployed in 2017 are based in Estonia, Latvia and Poland and are led by Britain, Canada and the United States, respectively. The three Baltic states, with a combined population of just six million people, were occupied and annexed by Moscow during World War II. They broke free from the Soviet Union in 1991 and joined both the European Union and NATO in 2004.
US spies elevate China rivalry to war of ideologies Washington (AFP) Feb 2, 2019 In a move that could harden Washington's posture toward Beijing for years, the US intelligence community has characterized relations with China as a global ideological showdown that will not be doused by trade deals or commercial theft crackdowns. US spy chiefs abruptly shifted their view of the superpower rivalry this week to something much deeper than a contest over markets, technology and geopolitics. The annual Worldwide Threat Assessment released by Director of National Intelligence Dan Coa ... read more
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