Joe Biden defends Nato as he promises extra defences for Ukraine | BBC News

Joe Biden defends Nato as he promises extra defences for Ukraine | BBC News

hello and a very warm welcome to the program I’m Sally bundock we begin in Washington where President Biden has launched the NATO Summit marking the 75th anniversary of the alliance’s creation he promised that the US and four other allies would provide Ukraine with dozens of additional Tactical Air Defense systems the package will include additional Patriot systems that K has been seeking to fight off the Russian Advance at the opening of The Summit Biden insisted Ukraine could and would stop Vladimir Putin he called NATO the single greatest and most effective defense Alliance in the world and stress the importance of international stability let’s take a listen to what he had to say before this war Putin thought NATO would break today NATO is stronger than it’s ever been in its history when this census War Began Ukraine was a free country today it is still a free country and the war will end with Ukraine remaining a free and independent country Russia will not Prevail Ukraine will prevail well Ukraine’s president vomir zelinski is at this Summit and he called on the US to be uncompromising in defending freedom and opposing Russian aggression it’s time to sit out to step out of the Shadows to make strong decisions work to act and not to wait for November or any other months to this end we must be strong and uncompromising all together and first of all America and first of all the leaders of America and the president of the United States as a leader of the Free World to be uncompromising in defending democracy uncompromising against Putin and his Cy uncompromising to every possible Terror well let’s go live to ke now and speak to our correspondent there Abdu Jalil abdur rasof uh just talk us through the reaction where you are to what’s been said so far at this NATO Summit this announcement is certainly welcomed by many people here in Ukraine because it comes shortly after a powerful air strike that happened on Monday where at least 43 people were killed and some 200 people were injured and that air strike was so shocking because one of the buildings that were hit by Russian missiles was the was the main hospital the main Children’s Hospital of Ukraine and some small patients who was battling for their lives uh from cancer they had to flee from Russian missiles and those images of children uh covered with blood and with their drips and then trying to be evacuated those images went viral and that was so shocking about that attack and of course this announcement will is expected to boost air defense systems for Ukrainian cities and those four Patriot uh air defense systems that were promised by Ukraine’s allies they are important because they can intercept uh uh the Hypersonic ballistic aerial ballistic missiles so they are very powerful and those countries are also promising to provide components for these missiles which include uh the um the missiles and other spare parts that are crucial to maintain these systems and and of course Ukraine hopes that this uh promise and this pledge will keep on because they they they’re saying they they need more and more weapons like this in order to protect their cities the attack on the hospital has been condemned globally President Biden saying it’s a a horrific reminder of Russia’s uh brutality yesterday was a day of mour marked across the country uh today presumably it’s still about uh a a search and rescue must have finished by now what I mean talk us through what’s happening on on the logistical side with regards to that attack on Monday yes the search andr operations are over by now and the the rescue workers they found they have found more bodies buried under the rubble and the number of dead uh has gone up to 43 people now and in ke alone 33 people were killed during that attack so most of those um casualties came uh on this city and that’s why this attack was so uh terrible for for the city which experienced a lot of similar air strikes in the past but because of the sheer number but also because the buildings that were targeted the Children’s Hospital there was also a maternity hospital that that was hit that by Uh Russian missiles these attacks uh made people to be so so shocked by uh by the strikes and now the the search since search operations are over uh there there is a funeral that is coming now and one of the doctors that was killed at that at the site of the hospital today it’s she she will be buried in the city of L in western part of Ukraine AB Jalil in thank you very much indeed well one of the comments that President M Biden made as he began the uh NATO uh Summit was that the alliance is the strongest is ever been I spoke to Rose got Muller who’s former deputy secret Secretary General of NATO I asked if she agreed with that I’ve been watching NATO now since I was deputy secretary General from 2016 to 19 NATO was strong then but uh it has really pulled together in its support for Ukraine and its uh really strong assistance to Ukraine with a lot of resources flowing to providing military assistance as well as humanitarian assistance to Ukraine and frankly uh it was a kind of performance I may not have expected Ed just five short years ago but clearly NATO saw that there is a new defense threat to Europe uh in Russia’s aggression against Ukraine and that it needed to pull together so you’re in agreement about that despite the fact that many key European leaders who are at the summit now I.E Emanuel macron Olaf Schultz are much weaker politically at home at the moment and and the the situation within Europe itself is changing ing dramatically politically what does that mean do you think for NATO I actually think it’s a strength of NATO the fact that countries across NATO are democracies some are uh well one would say perhaps uh somewhat questionable democracies as in the case of of Victor orban’s Hungary where he has shut down some of the the democratic practices and in particularly things like the pre free press and Judiciary but in other areas uh NATO allies are showing that uh democracy is messy there’s no question about it and we’ve seen that in France with the uh decision of macron to proceed with SNAP elections in in the last couple of weeks so yeah it’s uh the way things go I always remember on these occasions Winston Churchill saying democracy is the worst government system except for all the others democracy can be messy that is for sure and questions over Biden’s Fitness to govern is threatening to dominate the NATO Summit as the 81-year-old faces calls to quit the presidential race after disastrous debate performance against Donald Trump well let’s go live to Washington now our correspondent Carl nasman is there Carl he can’t get away from this can he really President Biden this conversation that’s ongoing and getting louder about whether he should stand again the conversation continues and a lot of that conversation is taking place within his own democratic party we’re hearing yet more lawmakers coming forward publicly and expressing their doubts about whether or not President Biden has what it takes to defeat Donald Trump with The Ballot Box in November that is a big topic of discussion obviously here this week in Washington for this NATO Summit because as we’ve been hearing Donald Trump is a NATO skeptic he has doubted whether or not the US should play such a big role whether it should spend so much money on this Alliance so every move every word from the president will be judged and monitored and basically under a microscope this week I think the president knows that he delivered a very forceful very energetic speech to open the summit just yesterday and so this is going to be a big test for him he knows that the next one might be on Thursday the president expected to give one of these press conferences that we really haven’t seen that much of he’ll be off prompter unlike he was during that speech and so that will be a big test of course for Joe Biden in the meantime uh Donald Trump was speaking at a rally at which he he suggested the two of them do a live TV debate without moderators I mean he he’s really seeing an opportunity here isn’t he Donald Trump well he is and it’s actually been interesting more than what Donald Trump said it’s what he hasn’t been saying for the past week or so we haven’t heard much from the former president I think he’s been enjoying being able to sit back and allow the Democratic party to make the headlines to allow Joe Biden to make the headlines for once not Donald Trump and obviously now coming out and being very willing to put Joe Biden back under that kind of microscope once again the Republicans are rejoicing in this we’ve seen some polls coming out after that debate performance that show that Trump has gained in several States he’s gained nationally of course it depends on what poll you look at but right now the Republican Party the the the Trump campaign in a very strong position and it’s really interesting how things have have changed because of course Trump did point out the fact that within the Republican Party they’re strong they’re United of course that’s his view whereas on the other side in the Democrats there’s Division and there’s this internal turmoil it’s really hard to emphasize just how unprecedented this is you rarely see a sitting president for a party running for re-election having this level of Doubt but of course this is us politics there is still plenty of time to go several months until November there is time for either the Democrats to coales around President Biden give him the confidence that he needs to run or to select another candidate of course that would mean that the President Biden have to drop out himself and that would be a very complicated process but there is still some time here I think the feeling is right now in Washington the next week or so will be critical to really shake this out and to figure out in which direction the part’s going to go and what we might see and who will be taking that stage uh come the Democratic National Convention a little bit later on Chicago well call we will be watching very closely thank you for now Carl nasman in Washington well let’s stay with the NATO Summit just a little longer because sakir starma has arrived in Washington for his first international trip as UK prime minister so these are the latest pictures accompanied by his wife Victoria they will be visiting the White House later to meet President Biden sakir pledged what he called a cast iron commitment to increase the UK’s defense spending to 2 and a half% of national income but he isn’t putting a timetable on when they might reach that figure here he speaking just before his flight took off our political editor Chris Mason sent this report when he landed in Washington hello welcome to Washington DC the Prime Minister K arriving here in the last few hours he’s getting some sleep ahead of this Summit getting underway in a few hours time delegations arriving from around the world quite a moment for karma a week ago the election hadn’t even happened now he is here on the world stage he’s got the foreign secretary David Lammy with him the defense secretary as well uh John Healey they’re trying to introduce themselves to as many of the UK’s allies as they can in the next few days to set out who they’re about and what the government is about and then of course there is the focus on defense and security NATO is a defense Alliance that’s what it’s all about it’s its 75th Anniversary Summit and there’s a recognition from leaders here that the world has not been this dangerous for decades and decades and decades a real focus of course on Ukraine and indeed uh on uh the Middle East Kia stama saying that he wants to spend 2 and a half% of the UK’s national income on defense but crucially he is not attaching a time frame to that it is a promise without a deadline and so some critics say it isn’t quite solid enough plenty then to come in the next few days as I say quite a moment for the new prime minister

US President Joe Biden has welcomed Nato leaders to Washington DC – and the war in Ukraine has been top of the agenda.

Warning that “autocrats” had overturned global order”, Mr Biden announced more military aid for Kyiv.

The US president and the leaders of Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Romania are donating Patriot missile batteries and other systems to bolster Ukraine’s beleaguered air defences.

In total, Nato plans to donate five strategic air defence systems and dozens of smaller, strategic anti-air batteries over the coming year, the White House said.

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