Latvian Foreign Minister Krishjanis Karinsh said that Russia "will not stop" after the war in Ukraine and that NATO needs a "long-term strategy" to contain Moscow.
"Russia will not stop, Russia can only be stopped," Karinsh said in an interview with the Financial Times published on Friday. "The stoppage of Russia in Ukraine does not mean that this is over. It just means we have to keep going. This is what is important for NATO: we will have to work on a long-term strategy to contain Russia."
Karinš, a former prime minister, has expressed interest in succeeding Jens Stoltenberg as NATO leader, arguing that the alliance's next secretary general should come from a country that has met its defense spending target of 2 percent of GDP, such as Latvia.
Due to the "imperialist ideology of Russia", Karinsh warned that the threat of the Kremlin will definitely remain even after the war in Ukraine. But NATO must make sure that "the possibility of any incidents is simply eliminated by our determination, our investments in defense," he said.
Karinsh is not the first high-ranking official to warn about Russia's military ambitions outside of Ukraine. Last month, the commander-in-chief of the Belgian army, Michel Hoffmann, said that the Kremlin may turn its attention to Moldova and the Baltic states after Kyiv.
In his bid to become NATO's next secretary-general, Carinjs faces former Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte — a favorite of major NATO powers such as the United States, Germany and France — and Estonian prime minister Kaja Kallas. Stoltenberg's term of office, which has been extended four times, ends in October 2024.
