According to the adviser, NATO has to plan a response to Russia’s hybrid threats.
„First, we are talking about preparing a list of certain measures so that the Alliance would not be caught off guard in every situation and would foresee in advance and communicate what it would do,“ Budrys told the radio station Žinių radijas on Tuesday.
The adviser says that NATO will not respond to Russia’s hybrid activities by undertaking „symmetrical actions“.
„If their agent carries out a kinetic action here, defaces a monument dear to us or burns down a shopping centre, NATO will not respond with identical actions, with symmetrical measures,“ the adviser stated.
According to Budrys, instead the EU may impose new sanctions on Russia, while NATO may deploy its forces or change the level of readiness.
The NATO summit in Washington, DC, begins Tuesday. It will focus on stepping up aid for Ukraine, adopting measures on long-term military and financial aid, training Ukrainian troops and discuss Ukraine’s NATO membership prospects.
Russia has been accused of carrying out sabotage in the West. It has been jamming GPS signals in the Baltic region. In Poland, a shopping centre was burned down in Warsaw in May. An Ikea warehouse was also set ablaze in Vilnius, Lithuania, in May. Russian opposition figure Leonid Volkov, an aide to the late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, was attacked and beaten in Vilnius in March.
Afterwards, in Poland, 3 people were detained over arson and 2 men were detained for attacking Volkov.