Baerbock attends talks about security in the Baltic Sea region in Bornholm

Bornholm (dpa) – The Acting Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock cautioned US President Donald Trump against agreeing to a dictated peace for Ukraine in his negotiations with Russia. She pointed out that the goal had to be to ensure a sustainable peace in which any further Russian aggression is ruled out. Baerbock is meeting her counterparts from the Nordic and Baltic states (Nordic-Baltic Cooperation NB8), as well as from Poland and France, on the Danish island of Bornholm. Baerbock said that Bornholm was unique in the way in which you could feel the close connections between people, economies and democracies that are provided by the lifelines of the Baltic Sea. She added, however, that you could also feel very clearly how the hybrid threat situation had intensified enormously. Submarine cables were being cut, data lines severed and power cables damaged, she said. The Russian shadow fleet did “not only fill the Russian war chest, but poses a threat to security and the environment in the North and Baltic Sea, too,” she cautioned. 

Baerbock stated that the hybrid attacks were another clear sign that showed that Russia's President Vladimir Putin did not rely on cooperation but on further aggression. To intensify cooperation in the Baltic Sea region was therefore also another investment in joint security, she said.