Washington DC [US], July 2 : US President Joe Biden will be heading to Europe for a three-country trip to the United Kingdom, Lithuania, and Finlandto bolster the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) coalition.
During his trip from July 9-13, President Biden will first travel to London, United Kingdom for engagements with King Charles III and Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to further strengthen the close relationship between our nations, the White House informed in a statement.
He will then travel to Vilnius, Lithuania from July 11- 12 to attend the 74th NATO Summit. This will be followed by a visit to Helsinki, Finland for a US-Nordic Leaders Summit.
According to Al Jazeera, the intention of Biden's Europe visit is to bolster the international coalition against Russian aggression as the war in Ukraine extends well into its second year.
The main focus of Biden's five-day visit will be the annual NATO summit, held this year in Vilnius, Lithuania.
Also planned are stops in Helsinki, Finland, to commemorate the Nordic country's entrance into the 31-nation military alliance in April, and Britain, the White House has announced.
The NATO meeting comes at the latest critical point in the war.
Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, says counter-offensive and defensive actions against Russian forces are underway as Ukrainian troops start to recapture territory in the southeastern part of the country, according to its military leaders, Al Jazeera reported.
Notably, the Russia-Ukraine war started after Ukraine expressed the desire to be a part of the NATO alliance.
Even after the Russian invasion going on for over a year, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is firm on the stand.
"I am also grateful for the support of our movement in NATO. It is now the obvious fact - the wider NATO is in Europe, the wider the space of peace is in Europe," he said on Twitter after meeting Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez on Saturday.
NATO's secretary-general, Jens Stoltenberg, visited the White House on June 13, where he and Biden again stressed that the Western alliance was united in defending Ukraine.
After the Russian attack on Ukraine, Finland and Sweden too expressed desire to join the NATO bloc for getting security assurances.
Finland joined the bloc in April this year after Turkey withdrew its objections over its membership.
However, Sweden has still not been able to join the grouping, as Turkey has "security concerns" with it and also accuses it of harbouring "terrorist groups".
In addition to this, Hungary too has objected to Sweden's entry in the bloc over the latter's criticism of Hungary's PM Orban.
The Russia-Ukraine war that started on February 24, 2022 has taken numerous lives and the war continues to escalate between the two nations even now.
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