MADRID (Reuters) – The United States will increase its destroyers based in southern Spain to six from four under an agreement to strengthen their bilateral strategic relationship, the countries said on Monday.
The agreement follows the commitment last June by U.S. President Joe Biden and Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez at a meeting held on the margins of the NATO Summit in Madrid.
The U.S. destroyers based at the Rota naval base in Cadiz are the only ones with a permanent home port in Europe. The ships are positioned to make daily operations in various missions, including ballistic missile defence and anti-aircraft warfare, the U.S. embassy said in a statement.
The destroyers will be deployed without modifying the missions, types of forces or maximum force levels of U.S. civilian and military personnel authorised under the Defence Cooperation Agreement, the Spanish Defence Ministry said.
Sanchez is due to travel to Washington to meet with Biden on Friday.
The agenda includes their strong mutual support for Ukraine against Russia, interest in deepening cooperation in Latin America and the Caribbean, and Spain taking over the rotating presidency of the Council of the European Union from July to December.
(Reporting by Jesús Aguado; Editing by Aislinn Laing and Richard Chang)
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