Estonia Prime Minister Kristen Michal Talks Hormuz Security

**SPEAKER_1** (0:02)
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**Oliver Crook** (0:07)
I mean, there's so much news to parse, and we're very lucky to be able to do so with one of the prime ministers and the leaders that was in the room there with the NATO allies, and also one of the nations that borders Russia, and of course, one of the nations that is spending the most in NATO in terms of the proportion of GDP. It's the Estonian Prime Minister, Kristen Michal, who joins us now, just fresh from this meeting, fresh from the comments from Donald Trump. I'd just like to get your general impression to begin with after this meeting you left just there with the President of the United States, 30 other leaders from NATO, including yourself. What is your impression from the meeting?

**Kristen Michal** (0:35)
I would say the pressures are quite positive because as Donald Trump said at his concluding remarks that he almost regrets that there were no cameras inside because all the European countries were saying, as we agreed in the Hague, that they will invest more in defense and the brother sharing with America will be there. And also that we are also this kind of security suppliers to each other. So Iran was mentioned, Ukraine was mentioned a lot, Russia's threat was mentioned a lot. So overall, the summit was positive.

**Oliver Crook** (1:09)
And thinking also about because going into that meeting, we heard a lot of negatives coming from the president of the United States. It sounds like he was much more positive in the room and that there's a sort of understanding between the Europeans and the Americans. You think that that is fair to say?

**Kristen Michal** (1:21)
I would say that that's fair to say because it also might be that Donald Trump was all the time there, listening to all the speeches, reacting to them and giving the feedback if needed. And I would say that the message from the European side was also quite clear on the NATO member side that we heard what was agreed in Hague and we are delivering. So for example, my country, as you said, we are the highest spenders or among the highest spenders. He mentioned us at the opening speeches, in Poland, that we are already delivering more than 5%.

**Oliver Crook** (1:55)
We've also heard comments from the President of the United States on the question of Iran, saying that he will probably strike Iran again, that he considers the ceasefire basically over at this point. Can you give us a little bit of the sort of texture of the conversation around Iran? Is there a pressure from the President of the United States to have NATO allies more included as we've heard from him over the last couple of weeks?

**Kristen Michal** (2:15)
I would say that the inside room and also publicly has been said, and my position is also that Iran must not have nuclear weapons. That's quite clear. And in that we support President Trump and America's position. Also everybody was quite happy about this kind of de-escalation and this kind of agreement.
Thank you.

**Oliver Crook** (2:55)
And something that we just heard from the President of the United States sitting alongside President Zelensky, and this is a massive piece of news for the Ukrainians that he's going to give licensing and agreement to build Patriot missiles domestically within Ukraine. I'd like just first your reaction to that and how significant you see that in the context of this war.

**Kristen Michal** (3:11)
That is, as you said, that is very significant. That is very significant because when you look at the situation in Ukraine, you see that Ukraine is asking and everybody is providing as much as they can, but they need Patriot systems and different kind of anti-ballistic systems.
So the message coming from the President of the US that is willing to consider giving Patriot licenses to Ukraine, that is huge.

**Oliver Crook** (3:40)
And it seems that he is also open to giving licenses beyond Ukraine to other European nations. If that were something that is on the table, is that something that Estonia would fight for, to build those Patriot systems within your country?

**Kristen Michal** (3:52)
We probably would talk with different members of NATO because we are enlarging our defense industry.
It's private sector based. So if there's interest or co-production interest, we probably would look into it.

**Oliver Crook** (4:07)
And thinking about the conversation you've had in there about Russia, we've heard from the president of the United States saying that he's been speaking a lot to Vladimir Putin. He says that he thinks that Russia's conditions for ending the war are changing. What is your impression of now the president's stance and also the conditions of the war at this stage?