US Vice President Mike Pence pledged support for the EU and NATO on Monday, distancing himself from comments made by President Donald Trump. President Trump referred to the NATO alliance as “obsolete” on the campaign trail and backed Brexit, marking a reversal of decades of US policy. But Pence sought to ease European concerns after a weekend spent at the Munich Security Conference in Germany.

Moscow has blasted NATO’s pre-positioning of US military hardware in Poland, saying it is a threat to Russian national security, and an agressive step.