Ukraine has officially become a member of the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (CCDCOE). This was reported on the Twitter account of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine.
“The national flag of Ukraine was officially raised at the headquarters of the NATO Cyber Defence Cooperation Centre in Tallinn, marking Ukraine’s official accession to the Centre,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
https://twitter.com/MFA_Ukraine/status/1658432462689652738
The MFA representatives also thanked the CCDCOE sponsoring countries for inviting Ukraine and expressed special gratitude to the Government of Estonia for its support and assistance on the way to the CCDCOE.
https://twitter.com/oleksiireznikov/status/1658513918065508370
The procedure for approving Ukraine’s application began in autumn 2021, but for some time Hungary blocked Ukraine’s accession. The meeting at which representatives of 27 NATO member states finally decided to grant Ukraine the status of a CCDCOE member state took place in early March 2023.
NATO’s Joint Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence is one of the Alliance’s centres for cyber defence of information systems and countering cyber attacks. It also provides education and training for NATO cyber defence specialists. The Centre is now one of the most important elements of the Alliance’s cyber defence capability development system.
The Centre was founded in 2008. At the initiative of Estonia, in response to cyberattacks against government websites after the Bronze Soldier monument incident, several countries signed a Memorandum of Understanding. These were Germany, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovenia, Spain, and Estonia itself. In 2010, Hungary joined the Centre, followed by Poland and the United States a year later. Later, the Netherlands, Austria, the Czech Republic, France, and the United Kingdom joined.
Read also:
- UK to provide Ukraine with long-range strike drones
- Rheinmetall and Ukroboronprom set up a joint venture to repair and manufacture tanks