President Dan: Romania's defense strategy up for public debate: We want to defend our citizens

  The central concept of the National Defense Strategy is "solidarity independence", President Nicusor Dan declared on Wednesday during a press conference at the Cotroceni Palace, explaining that the actions of the Romanian state will be aimed at defending national interests, while maintaining international commitments and partnerships.With the National Defense Strategy up for debate, the president pointed out that "An important element is that we present this strategy, or we try to do it, from the citizen's perspective. That is, our aim is not to defend the state, but the citizen who lives, resides in this state. Here, the question that arises is how much the citizen trusts this instrument, the state, and what is their eventual willingness to defend it. And here of course I do not know if the answer is the most fortunate and that is precisely our point, and part of this strategy is about correcting the gap between the society's advance on so many levels, including economy-wise, and the public administration's lagging behind the expectations of this society, which has matured in many aspects."The current strategy differs from the previous ones by the "different" geopolitical context, as the international order "is now being called into question" and there is an "increase in military tensions all over the world", the president mentioned."We somehow see a tendency of authoritarian-governed states to align, and we see a diminution of the capacity of international bodies to preserve the rules-based international order," Nicusor Dan said.He highlighted the "exponential" growth of technological evolution, but also the fact that military power and the defense capacity are no longer necessarily directly proportional to the economy and defense investments."Those who fail to take the technological leap that others are making will pay a much higher penalty than so far," the president also specified.Nicusor Dan highlighted the risks of manipulation, disinformation, and cross-border threats amid digitalization, as well as the rising sabotage of critical infrastructure."We see economic protectionism, we see a fight over critical resources and a limitation - something we did not see a few years ago - a limitation of access to critical resources. We see an increase in sabotage and disruption actions on critical infrastructure, more than we saw in previous years. We see radicalization and a rise in anti-democratic tendencies, which are also maintained by state actors. We see an increase in transnational, cross-border threats, drug trafficking, illegal migration and, last but not least, we see stronger effects of climate change," he underscored.Nicusor Dan argued in favor of maintaining Romania's partnerships, but also for asserting Romania's interests within the EU, NATO and in the partnership with the United States.He also tackled the vulnerability represented by the lack of collaboration between institutions, as well as the fact that decisions are not made based on data."There are many situations in which decisions are not based on data. We do not see a great appetite for collaboration between public institutions. Everyone is concerned with their own little sectoral policy and because of this, we do not have an integrated vision and, of course, also because of this, administration personnel have no drive to innovate, no courage to make proposals, they rather stick to a defensive attitude that causes the Romanian administration to wallow in a routine it does not know how to get out of," Nicusor Dan also said.Corruption is another vulnerability highlighted in the strategy. This "weakens social cohesion", affects the economy and the quality of the administration. In order to combat corruption, the president supports the collaboration of institutions with relevant responsibilities and the involvement of intelligence services in data collection."First of all, we need an integrated approach in the sense of collaboration between all institutions that have these powers. In the second place, the involvement of intelligence services in collecting data on this phenomenon and that's it - I expressly stated that this presupposes no involvement in the criminal investigation stage and in the justice process. And the correction of legislative and administrative mechanisms that delay the achievement of justice in matters of corruption, because this is one of the main issues we and all Romanians see: the delay of years in combating phenomena that are obvious to the society," he stressed.Romania's geographical position gives it the opportunity to be a "connectivity center in the relationship between Europe and Asia," added Nicusor Dan, stressing that this aspect depends largely on stability in the Black Sea region."The increase in global demand for military equipment provides an opportunity for our industry, which has tradition, which still has professionals, which has facilities and, fortunately, in Romania we have interesting automotive and technology companies," said the president.He also insisted on the importance of commercial diplomacy in order to capitalize on the potential of the private economy, adding that stopping tax evasion is also a matter of national security.   President Nicusor Dan announced on Wednesday that a meeting of the Supreme Council for National Defence (CSAT) will be held on 24 November to discuss the National Defence Strategy.The head of state said that the Strategy will be presented in Parliament on 26 November.'It will be followed by an implementation plan that will not be made public, but the deadlines will be provided,' he said.   (Romanian version: https://www.presidency.ro/ro/media/csat/strategia-nationala-de-aparare-a-tarii-pentru-perioada-2025-2030)