section_path: NATO Secretary General (2014–2024)/2022
section_name: 2022
paragraph_text: 2022
  
  On 14 January Stoltenberg condemned the 2022 Ukraine cyberattack. He stated that NATOs day experts in Brussels has exchanged information with Ukraine, and that experts from the alliance would be assisting Ukrainian authorities with the matter. He added: "In the coming days, NATO and Ukraine will sign an agreement on enhanced cooperation on data security, including Ukraine's access to NATO's malware sharing platform".
  
  On 19 February at the Munich Security Conference Stoltenberg remarked that despite NATO's "strong diplomatic efforts to find a political solution... we have seen no sign of withdrawal or de-escalation so far. On the contrary, Russia's build-up continues." He said "we have made written proposals to the Putin administration to reduce risks and increase transparency of military activities, address space and cyber threats, and engage on arms control, including on nuclear weapons and missiles... is attempting to roll back history. And recreate spheres of influence. wants to limit NATO's right to collective defence... and demands that we should remove all our forces and infrastructure from the countries that joined NATO after the fall of the Berlin Wall... wants to deny sovereign countries the right to choose their own path. And their own security arrangements. For Ukraine – but also for other countries, such as Finland and Sweden. And for the first time, we now see Beijing joining Moscow in calling on NATO to stop admitting new members. It is an attempt to control the fate of free nations. To rewrite the international rulebook. And impose their own authoritarian models of governance." On the dais with him was Ursula von der Leyen. Together they proceeded to give an interview to the witness audience.
  
  On 21 February 2022, Stoltenberg condemned Russia's diplomatic recognition of two self-proclaimed separatist republics in Donbas.
  
  On 4 March 2022, Stoltenberg said NATO would not establish a no-fly zone over Ukraine. He said, "we are not part of this conflict, and we have a responsibility to ensure that it does not escalate and spread beyond Ukraine, because that would be even more devastating and more dangerous."
  
  On 8 March 2022, Stoltenberg warned that if there is any Russia's attack "against any NATO country, NATO territory, that will trigger Article 5" of the North Atlantic Treaty.
  
  On 23 March 2022, Stoltenberg accused China of providing political support to Russia, "including by spreading blatant lies and misinformation, and expressed concern that "China could provide material support for the Russian invasion ".
  
  On 28 March the establishment of four more multinational battlegroups in Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania and Slovakia was announced, although the Slovak battlegroup had already been announced on 27 February. This brings the total number of multinational battlegroups to eight, and Stoltenberg said ahead of an extraordinary NATO summit scheduled for March 24 in Brussels that "we will have eight multinational NATO battle groups all along the Eastern flank from the Baltic to the Black Sea". The Baltic Sea is guarded by the NATO Enhanced Forward Presence, to which the four more would be added. A multinational brigade headquarters exists in Craiova, Romania and this seems to be the distribution point of the extra four battlegroups. The summit statements by Biden and NATO were somewhat controversial.