The announcement was made on Friday, 15 June, by the Prime Minister of Romania, Mrs. Viorica Dăncilă, on a visit to the Estonian capital.

"Romania recognises the value of cooperation in building resilience in the cyber domain. NATO CCDCOE leads unique international cyber defence exercise, trainings and research initiatives. We are glad to be on the path of joining this exceptional Centre'' Mrs. Dăncilă said.

Merle Maigre, Director of the CCDCOE added that "we are proud to see that Allies in NATO want to be also strong Allies in our cyber defence hub. Enhancing cyber defence is all about teamwork and we welcome the decision of Romania to contribute to the strength and capability of our unique team."

The CCDCOE, founded in 2014, is a NATO-accredited cyber defence hub of currently around 20 mostly NATO nations focusing on research, training and exercises. It is also the repository for the Tallinn Manual 2.0, which is the most comprehensive guide to how International Law applies regarding cyber operations.

The CCDCOE also also organises the world's largest and most complex international live-fire cyber defence exercise, named Locked Shields, and the annual International Conference on Cyber Conflict, CyCon, which took place in Tallinn at the beginning of June this year.

The current member states of the CCDCOE are Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Turkey, the United Kingdom and the United States.

Romania and Estonia both joined NATO in 2004.