The Czech Republic will increase its contribution to the NATO budget by 42 million korunas (€1,680 million). The increase is quite significant as currently, Czechia contributes 580 million korunas (€23,1 million).
NATO member states agreed to renegotiate their financial contribution to the NATO budget after the United States decided to reduce its contribution from 22 percent to 16 percent.
The issue of NATO’s funding and defense spending will be one of the main themes of the upcoming NATO Summit in London, which will take place this Tuesday and Wednesday.
At the summit, the Czech Republic will be represented by President Miloš Zeman, Foreign Minister Tomáš Petříček, Defense Minister Lubomír Metnar and Czech Permanent Representative to NATO Jakub Landovský.
As for the world leaders, US President Donald Trump, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron will be among attendees.
According to Rudolf Jindrák, the head of the foreign affairs department of the presidential office, the initial purpose of the summit was to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the establishment of NATO. However, due to new developments around the world, the Alliance has decided to include other topics on the agenda.
NATO leaders will, therefore, talk about NATO funding, Afghanistan and issues in the Middle East.
At the plenary session, each of the representatives of the NATO member states will give three- to four-minute-long speeches. President Zeman has already announced he wants to talk about the need to focus on the fight against international terrorism. He would like the Alliance to become more active in this regard.
Zeman may also speak about defense spending as he repeatedly supports the Czech Republic to meet the required two percent of its GDP on defense. Currently, it is around 1.2 percent of GDP, however, the Czech Republic has committed to achieving the two percent expenditure by 2024.
NATO’s budget is about $2.5 billion (€2.27 billion).
