The president of parliament believes that NATO’s dual dimension of an area of defense and freedom has never been more important than today, and highlighted Portugal’s role in strengthening the Atlantic Alliance’s southern flank.
These positions were conveyed to the Lusa news agency by José Pedro Aguiar-Branco, who is attending the NATO Parliamentary Assembly summit in Washington, which brings together 32 delegations from member states, including 23 presidents of national parliaments.
“This summit is taking place on the 75th anniversary of NATO, a milestone that reveals the importance of the Atlantic Alliance in its security and defense dimension. Everyone is aware that today democracy and freedom are at stake, as is the world as we want it to be in a free society. Never before has this dual reality been present among all its member states,” said the President of the Portuguese Parliament.
José Pedro Aguiar-Branco, the former Social Democrat Minister of Defense, is in Washington accompanied by the Vice-President of the Assembly of the Republic, the Socialist Marcos Perestrello.
In more operational terms, according to the president of the Portuguese parliament, this high-level meeting of NATO’s Parliamentary Assembly is looking at strengthening the link between the Atlantic Alliance’s eastern and southern flanks.
“Although the immediate risks are on the eastern flank, because of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, we are aware that the threats are global. We have threats such as disinformation, often via social networks, which aims to create instability in NATO, particularly in terms of enlargement objectives,” he said.
In this context, the President of the Portuguese Parliament also defended the need to create a strong line of communication with third countries.
“At this summit, we will recognize that, today, parliaments play a very important role, in that they represent different political families and form the positions of different countries. The greater the inter-parliamentary exchange of experiences, the greater the coordination, the greater the quality of the Atlantic Alliance will be,” he added.