BRUSSELS, June 20 — In an important decision, all 32 NATO member states have agreed to the nomination of Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte as the next Secretary General, set to succeed Norway’s Jens Stoltenberg. This information was reported by Politico and indicates that Rutte is expected to be officially appointed during the Washington summit in July.
Mark Rutte will become the next NATO secretary-general after all 32 members of the alliance agreed that the outgoing Dutch prime minister will succeed Jens Stoltenberg. Following endorsements from Hungary and Slovakia on Tuesday, Romania confirmed its support for Rutte on Thursday, with Romanian President Klaus Iohannis withdrawing his candidacy for the NATO top job,” Politico’s report states.
Rutte will assume office as the new Secretary General on October 2 and will serve a term of five years.
Politico emphasizes that one of Rutte’s primary objectives will be to increase the military spending of all member states up to 2% of their GDP. During his tenure as prime minister, however, Rutte was unable to bring the Netherlands’ military spending to this level. According to NATO data, it is only this year that the Netherlands will reach the 2% figure, bringing the total number of member states reaching this threshold in 2021 to 23 out of 32.