The NATO chief's acquaintance with Putin "What he is doing is unacceptable"

Jens Stoltenberg Stoltenberg's acquaintance with Putin: "Worked together for many years" 

 

Of: 

 

Josefine Karlsson 

 

Published: Today 00.18 

 

NEWS 

 

NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg is an old acquaintance of Vladimir Putin. 

 

He tells Dagbladet that they "met and collaborated for many years". 

 

Now they are on opposite sides of the war. 

 

- What he is doing is unacceptable, he tells the newspaper (

tidningen)

. 

 

Jens Stoltenberg was Norway's Prime Minister in 2000-2001 and 2005-2013. Since 2014, he has been Secretary General of the NATO defense alliance. 

 

He is also an old acquaintance of Vladimir Putin. For over 20 years, they have had personal contact with each other,  Dagbladet reports after a large interview with Jens Stoltenberg on location in Brussels. 

 

- After the Kursk accident (the Russian nuclear submarine that sank in the Barents Sea in August 2000, ed. note) Putin called me. We have met and collaborated for many years, he tells the newspaper.

Photo: Gavriil Grigorov / AP 

"Responsible for killing thousands of people" 

 

Now the NATO chief and the Russian president are on opposite sides of the war. Stoltenberg does not want to rate Putin, but does not mince words. 

 

- My personal assessment of Putin is not what is decisive. Putin must be judged by what he actually does. And what he is doing is unacceptable. He leads a military attack on another country. He is responsible for thousands of people being killed in a brutal offensive war. 

 

Stoltenberg has repeatedly stressed that Sweden and Finland are welcome to join NATO. Turkey and Hungary have not yet ratified Sweden's membership in the defense alliance. But Stoltenberg is confident that Sweden and Finland will become members in the end as the accession protocol was signed at the summit in Madrid in June. 

 

 

Jens Stoltenberg together with Vladimir Putin in 2009. Photo: Terje Bendiksby / NTB 

 

- I am convinced that it will happen. Also because I know that Sweden, Finland and Turkey are busy implementing the agreements they agreed on at the summit. Among other things, cooperation against terrorism, he says. 

 

"Wars are inherently unpredictable" 

 

The plan was for Stoltenberg to leave his post on October 1, 2022. A few weeks before the war broke out, he got a top job as head of the central bank in Norway. 

 

But then the war broke out and NATO shifted gears. Exactly one month after the invasion, it was announced that Stoltenberg would continue for another year as NATO chief. Then the plan is to move home to Norway from Brussels. He fears that the war will continue for a long time to come. 

 

 

"Wars are inherently unpredictable," says Jens Stoltenberg. Photo: Olivier Matthys / AP

 

- I am careful not to believe anything, because wars are by their nature unpredictable. At the same time, we are prepared for the possibility that the war may continue. We must do what we can to end the war, so that we preserve Ukraine as an independent democratic nation, he tells Dagbladet.