Nato officials and foreign ministers take break from discussing military crises to join hands and sing Michael Jackson's 'We Are The World'
One of the most bizarre ends to a day's military alliance discussions
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Your support makes all the difference.Most headlines from the Nato conference in Turkey have centred on urgent calls for troops from Baltic countries in the face of Russian aggression.
But in between their discussions of the Ukraine crisis and Middle East instability, foreign ministers and officials still found time to let their hair down with a bizarre rendition of Michael Jackson’s “We Are The World”.
If this was the “last song for peace”, as it was billed by the Turkish band who invited dignitaries on stage to take part, war can surely not be far away.
Spotted in the video of the possibly drink-fuelled performance were the foreign ministers of Greece and Turkey Mevlut Cavusoglu and Nikos Kotzias, leading proceedings and swaying arm-in-arm.
Nato Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, EU Foreign Policy chief Federica Mogherini and many others also joined in the sing-along, Reuters reported.
“We Are The World” was written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie as a charity single in 1985 for the supergroup USA for Africa. It came just seven weeks after “Do They Know It’s Christmas” by Bob Geldof and Midge Ure, in what was truly a golden age for catchy but vacuous appeal songs.
Meanwhile at the Nato conference, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania all requested a brigade-size unit of Nato troops each (around 800 soldiers) in a joint letter to the military alliance’s commander.
“It is necessary because of the security situation,” Neimontas told The Associated Press on Thursday. “It's not getting better in our region, so it will be a deterrent.”
Russia's ambassador to the EU, Vladimir Chizhov, said the Baltic request was motivated by “local politics rather than a genuine security situation”.
“Because nobody is threatening the Baltics — at least, nobody that I know of,” he said.
Additional reporting by agencies
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