{"id":913,"date":"2025-07-18T07:04:22","date_gmt":"2025-07-18T07:04:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.airnetaccess.com\/?p=913"},"modified":"2025-07-24T12:30:36","modified_gmt":"2025-07-24T12:30:36","slug":"putin-is-a-long-term-threat-to-the-freedom-of-europe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.airnetaccess.com\/index.php\/2025\/07\/18\/putin-is-a-long-term-threat-to-the-freedom-of-europe\/","title":{"rendered":"Putin is \u2018a long-term threat to the freedom of Europe\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\t\t\"Mandatory\t<\/div>
Ukrainian firefighters work to extinguish a fire following mass Russian strikes in Donetsk (Picture: Ukrainian State Emergency Service\/UPI\/Shutterstock)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The German<\/a> chancellor has warned Putin<\/a> poses a long term threat to the whole of Europe<\/a> and not just Ukraine<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Friedrich Merz said the US<\/a>’s accusations that the continent was doing too little to secure its own defence was right as Putin continues to make threats against Western Europe.<\/p>\n

In a visits to the UK in a bid boost the countries’ defence ties as part of a friendship treaty, the chancellor said more need to be done to prepare against Putin’s threats. <\/p>\n

He told the BBC<\/a>: ‘We are seeing a big threat, and the threat is Russia<\/a>. And this threat is not only on Ukraine<\/a>.<\/p>\n

‘It’s on our peace, on our freedom, on the political order of Europe.’ <\/p>\n

Merz said US President Donald Trump<\/a>’s accusations that the continent was doing too little to secure its own defence was right, admitting they had been ‘free-riders in the past’.<\/p>\n

At a security conference in Munich in the run up to the German election, US Vice-President JD Vance<\/a> read out a list of accusations against European countries.<\/p>\n

\n
\n\t\t\"In\t<\/div>
A Russian self-propelled multiple rocket launcher fires towards a Ukrainian position (Picture: AP)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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\n\t\t\"STEVENAGE,\t<\/div>
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz yesterday (Picture: WPA Pool\/Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Following this, the new chancellor was able to push for a change in the German constitution to allow for a rise in defence spending, describing the new rule was ‘to do whatever it takes’. <\/p>\n

He said: ‘We are not strong enough, our army is not strong enough, so that’s the reason why we are spending a lot of money.’ <\/p>\n

On the night of his election victory, he said Trump’s administration was ‘largely indifferent to the fate of Europe’.<\/p>\n

Instead the UK, France and Germany are working on an alliance dubbed the E3 to focus on security as well as economic growth. <\/p>\n

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The weapons will be \u2018quickly distributed to the battlefield\u2019, he said.<\/p>\n<p>As Trump issued the threat, seven regions in northern and eastern Ukraine were under air alerts after drones killed four people and injured 21 others in the Kharkiv and Sumy areas.<\/p>\n<p>He announced the threat to Russia during a meeting with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte.<\/p>\n<p>Trump has threatened to hit European imports with 30% sanctions. Denmark\u2019s foreign minister, Lars Rasmussen, called it \u2018absolutely unacceptable and unjustified\u2019 and said that Europe does \u2018not want a trade war\u2019 with America.<\/p>\n<p>The European Union\u2019s trade commissioner said they are considering\u00a0retaliatory tariffs if Trump moves forward.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\"><strong><strong><strong>Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"mailto:webnews@metro.co.uk\" target=\"_blank\">webnews@metro.co.uk<\/a>.<\/strong><\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"\"><strong>For more stories like this, <\/strong><a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/metro.co.uk\/news\/\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>check our news page<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<section id=\"share-buttons-bottom-start\" class=\"share-buttons share-buttons-bottom\"><a class=\"comment-now metro-button metro-comments-cta\" data-vars-position=\"bottom\" href=\"#metro-comments-container\"><br \/>\n\t\t\t<span><title>Comment now<\/title><\/span><br \/>\n\t\t\t<span class=\"comment-now__label\">Comments<\/span><br \/>\n\t\t<\/a><\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ukrainian firefighters work to extinguish a fire following mass Russian strikes in Donetsk (Picture: Ukrainian State Emergency Service\/UPI\/Shutterstock) The German chancellor has warned Putin poses a long term threat to the whole of Europe and not just Ukraine. Friedrich Merz said the US’s accusations that the continent was doing too little to secure its own defence was right as Putin continues to make threats against Western Europe. In a visits to the UK in a bid boost the countries’ defence … <a href=\"http:\/\/www.airnetaccess.com\/index.php\/2025\/07\/18\/putin-is-a-long-term-threat-to-the-freedom-of-europe\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> “Putin is \u2018a long-term threat to the freedom of Europe\u2019”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":339,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-913","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cost-of-living"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.airnetaccess.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/913","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.airnetaccess.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.airnetaccess.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.airnetaccess.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.airnetaccess.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=913"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.airnetaccess.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/913\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":918,"href":"http:\/\/www.airnetaccess.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/913\/revisions\/918"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.airnetaccess.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/339"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.airnetaccess.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.airnetaccess.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.airnetaccess.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}