Today (7 November 2024), Secretary General Mark Rutte participated in a meeting of the European Political Community in Budapest, Hungary.
The meeting was an opportunity for European leaders to discuss a broad range of security challenges and the importance of working together to address them. This included exchanges not only on traditional threats and challenges but also on issues like economic security and critical dependencies. Mr. Rutte highlighted the importance of working together - not only across the European community but through NATO and its global partners as well. He noted the growing alignment between Russia, China, North Korea and Iran, which are working together to support Russia's war against Ukraine - a reality that has broader impacts. In exchange for this support, Rutte said, "Russia is delivering technology to North Korea" that will enable the DPRK to "threaten the US mainland, continental Europe and our Indo-Pacific partners". "These are new, dangerous developments that we need to discuss together."
In the margins of the meeting in Budapest, the Secretary General met with a number of other leaders including the host, Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Albanian President Edi Rama, and others.
