US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Tuesday invoked the 30th anniversary of the demise of communism to implore countries in Central and Eastern Europe to resist Chinese and Russian influence.
Speaking in the Slovak capital of Bratislava, Pompeo said China and Russia pose twin threats to the democratic and free-market gains made since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989.
He said the post-communist countries are particularly vulnerable to Chinese and Russian predatory investment and political meddling.
To combat the threat, he said the United States is committed to boosting its engagement in the region, through defense cooperation agreements and exchange programs.
"I want to make sure that the Slovakian people understand that America is engaged, we're back," he said at a brief ceremony at Slovakia's "Gate of Freedom" a memorial on the banks of the Morava River at the Slovakian border with Austria that commemorates the 400 people killed at the borders of the former Czechoslovakia while attempting to escape the Iron Curtain between 1945 and 1989.
"This relationship was built on shared values and now we must sustain it on those same, especially as Russian aggression undermines freedom on this continent, but also against a China that represses people while it's expanding its influence abroad," he said.
"We must recommit to our values again and again and again generation after generation to ensure that they live on."
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