BRUSSELS, Jan. 3 (DPA/EP) –

The Secretary General of NATO, Jens Stoltenberg, announced Tuesday new negotiations with member states on increasing the defense budget, especially in light of the current geopolitical situation.

“Some allies are very much in favor of raising the target to 2 percent and bringing it to the minimum,” he explained, before declaring that he would preside over such talks. “We will meet, we will hold our meeting at the ministerial level, we will talk about money,” he said.

In this regard, he has indicated that he is confident that Member States will be able to reach agreement on the objectives of the next summit, which is scheduled for July 11 and 12 in the Lithuanian capital, Vilnius.

Currently, NATO members must contribute as much as possible of at least 2 percent of their Gross Domestic Product to be allocated to Defense by 2024, a matter agreed in Wales in 2014 after Russia’s annexation of the Crimean peninsula.

Stoltenberg, however, has not specified which allies are now requesting an increase in this cap, which he has called a “threshold” on previous occasions. Countries such as Poland, Lithuania and the UK have recently supported reaching an agreement to increase funding in light of advances by Russian troops in Ukraine.

However, Germany, Canada and Belgium, among others, have expressed their opposition to this measure because they invest less than 2 percent of GDP in Defense. The dispute over the budget increase has especially increased under the mandate of former US President Donald Trump, who has come to accuse the government of Germany and other European allies of threatening to drive the United States out of the alliance.