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164-497: Szczecin ( UK : / ˈ ʃ tʃ ɛ tʃ ɪ n / SHCHETCH -in , US : /- tʃ iː n / -⁠een , Polish: [ˈʂt͡ʂɛt͡ɕin] ; German : Stettin [ʃtɛˈtiːn] ; Swedish : Stettin [stɛˈtiːn] ; Latin : Sedinum or Stetinum ) is the capital and largest city of the West Pomeranian Voivodeship in northwestern Poland . Located near

328-705: A Plague during the Great Northern War , the city's population dropped from 6,000 people in 1709 to 4,000 in 1711. In 1720, after the Great Northern War, Sweden was forced to cede the city to King Frederick William I of Prussia . Stettin was made the capital city of the Prussian Pomeranian province , since 1815 reorganised as the Province of Pomerania . In 1816, the city had 26,000 inhabitants. The Prussian administration deprived

492-576: A West Germanic language that originated from the Anglo-Frisian dialects brought to Britain by Germanic settlers from various parts of what is now northwest Germany and the northern Netherlands. The resident population at this time was generally speaking Common Brittonic —the insular variety of Continental Celtic , which was influenced by the Roman occupation. This group of languages ( Welsh , Cornish , Cumbric ) cohabited alongside English into

656-699: A general strike . All these were suppressed by the authorities. Pope John Paul II visited the city on 11   June 1987. Another wave of strikes in Szczecin broke out in 1988 and 1989, which eventually led to the Round Table Agreement and first semi-free elections in post-war Poland . Szczecin has been the capital of the West Pomeranian Voivodeship since 1999. Szczecin has an oceanic climate ( Köppen : Cfb ) with some humid continental ( Dfb ) characteristics in normal not updated, typical of Western Pomerania . The winters are colder than on

820-409: A Polish Scout team and a Polish school. German historian Musekamp writes, "however, only very few Poles were active in these institutions, which for the most part were headed by employees of the [Polish] consulate." The withdrawal of the consulate from these institutions led to a general decline of these activities, which were in part upheld by Golisz and Aleksander Omieczyński. Intensified repressions by

984-559: A century as Received Pronunciation (RP). However, due to language evolution and changing social trends, some linguists argue that RP is losing prestige or has been replaced by another accent, one that the linguist Geoff Lindsey for instance calls Standard Southern British English. Others suggest that more regionally-oriented standard accents are emerging in England. Even in Scotland and Northern Ireland, RP exerts little influence in

1148-524: A confrontation between US Defense Secretary Robert Gates and countries such as Poland, Spain, the Netherlands, Turkey, and Germany with Gates calling on the latter to contribute more and the latter believing the organization has overstepped its mandate in the conflict. In his final policy speech in Brussels on 10 June, Gates further criticized allied countries in suggesting their actions could cause

1312-571: A fight. In 1809, also Polish troops were stationed in the city, while the French remained until 1813. From 1683 to 1812, one Jew was permitted to reside in Stettin, and an additional Jew was allowed to spend a night in the city in case of "urgent business". These permissions were repeatedly withdrawn between 1691 and 1716, also between 1726 and 1730 although else the Swedish regulation was continued by

1476-508: A greater movement, normally [əʊ], [əʉ] or [əɨ]. Dropping a morphological grammatical number , in collective nouns , is stronger in British English than North American English. This is to treat them as plural when once grammatically singular, a perceived natural number prevails, especially when applying to institutional nouns and groups of people. The noun 'police', for example, undergoes this treatment: Police are investigating

1640-406: A lesser class or social status and often discounted or considered of a low intelligence. Another contribution to the standardisation of British English was the introduction of the printing press to England in the mid-15th century. In doing so, William Caxton enabled a common language and spelling to be dispersed among the entirety of England at a much faster rate. Samuel Johnson's A Dictionary of

1804-561: A major reform of France's military position, culminating with the return to full membership on 4 April 2009, which also included France rejoining the NATO Military Command Structure , while maintaining an independent nuclear deterrent. The 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea led to strong condemnation by all NATO members, and was one of the seven times that Article 4 , which calls for consultation among NATO members, has been invoked. Prior times included during

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1968-631: A no-fly zone over Libya shortly afterwards, beginning with Opération Harmattan by the French Air Force on 19 March. On 20 March 2011, NATO states agreed on enforcing an arms embargo against Libya with Operation Unified Protector using ships from NATO Standing Maritime Group 1 and Standing Mine Countermeasures Group 1 , and additional ships and submarines from NATO members. They would "monitor, report and, if needed, interdict vessels suspected of carrying illegal arms or mercenaries ". On 24 March, NATO agreed to take control of

2132-759: A peaceful German reunification. A June 2016 Levada Center poll found that 68 percent of Russians think that deploying NATO troops in the Baltic states and Poland – former Eastern bloc countries bordering Russia – is a threat to Russia. In contrast, 65 percent of Poles surveyed in a 2017 Pew Research Center report identified Russia as a "major threat", with an average of 31 percent saying so across all NATO countries, and 67 percent of Poles surveyed in 2018 favour US forces being based in Poland. Of non- CIS Eastern European countries surveyed by Gallup in 2016, all but Serbia and Montenegro were more likely than not to view NATO as

2296-659: A process called T-glottalisation . National media, being based in London, have seen the glottal stop spreading more widely than it once was in word endings, not being heard as "no [ʔ] " and bottle of water being heard as "bo [ʔ] le of wa [ʔ] er". It is still stigmatised when used at the beginning and central positions, such as later , while often has all but regained /t/ . Other consonants subject to this usage in Cockney English are p , as in pa [ʔ] er and k as in ba [ʔ] er. In most areas of England and Wales, outside

2460-527: A protective alliance rather than a threat. A 2006 study in the journal Security Studies argued that NATO enlargement contributed to democratic consolidation in Central and Eastern Europe. China also opposes further expansion. Member states pay for NATO's three common funds (the civil and military budgets and the security investment programme) based on a cost-sharing formula that includes per capita gross national income and other factors. In 2023–2024,

2624-511: A quick-reaction force was deployed to the area. The Bosnian War began in 1992, as a result of the breakup of Yugoslavia . The deteriorating situation led to United Nations Security Council Resolution 816 on 9 October 1992, authorizing its member-states to enforce a previously declared no-fly zone under the United Nations Protection Force over central Bosnia and Herzegovina. NATO complied and started enforcing

2788-922: A red line . However, there were no such plans to deploy missiles in Ukraine. The Russian Foreign Ministry drafted a treaty that would forbid Ukraine or any former Soviet state from ever joining NATO. Secretary-General Stoltenberg replied that the decision is up to Ukraine and NATO members, adding "Russia has no veto, Russia has no say, and Russia has no right to establish a sphere of influence to try to control their neighbors". NATO offered to improve communications with Russia and discuss missile placements and military exercises, as long as Russia withdrew troops from Ukraine's borders. Instead, Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. Ukraine applied for NATO membership in September 2022 after Russia proclaimed it had annexed

2952-520: A regional accent or dialect. However, about 2% of Britons speak with an accent called Received Pronunciation (also called "the King's English", "Oxford English" and " BBC English" ), that is essentially region-less. It derives from a mixture of the Midlands and Southern dialects spoken in London in the early modern period. It is frequently used as a model for teaching English to foreign learners. In

3116-744: A strategic re-evaluation of NATO's purpose, nature, tasks, and focus on the continent. In October 1990, East Germany became part of the Federal Republic of Germany and the alliance, and in November 1990, the alliance signed the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) in Paris with the Soviet Union. It mandated specific military reductions across the continent, which continued after

3280-520: A way unlikely to attract public notice. The action was the first deportation of Jews from prewar territory in Nazi Germany. Allied air raids in 1944 and heavy fighting between the German and Soviet armies destroyed 65% of Stettin's buildings and almost all of the city centre, the seaport, and local industries. Polish Home Army intelligence assisted in pinpointing targets for Allied bombing in

3444-575: Is 537 mm, the average rainfall in the cool half-year is 225 mm, and in the warmer half-year is 350 mm. On average, 167 days with precipitation occurs. See or edit raw graph data . British English British English (abbreviations: BrE , en-GB , and BE ) is the set of varieties of the English language native to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland . More narrowly, it can refer specifically to

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3608-725: Is also due to London-centric influences. Examples of R-dropping are car and sugar , where the R is not pronounced. British dialects differ on the extent of diphthongisation of long vowels, with southern varieties extensively turning them into diphthongs, and with northern dialects normally preserving many of them. As a comparison, North American varieties could be said to be in-between. Long vowels /iː/ and /uː/ are usually preserved, and in several areas also /oː/ and /eː/, as in go and say (unlike other varieties of English, that change them to [oʊ] and [eɪ] respectively). Some areas go as far as not diphthongising medieval /iː/ and /uː/, that give rise to modern /aɪ/ and /aʊ/; that is, for example, in

3772-488: Is based on British English, but has more influence from American English , often grouped together due to their close proximity. British English, for example, is the closest English to Indian English, but Indian English has extra vocabulary and some English words are assigned different meanings. NATO The North Atlantic Treaty Organization ( NATO / ˈ n eɪ t oʊ / NAY -toh ; French : Organisation du traité de l'Atlantique nord , OTAN ), also called

3936-795: Is included in style guides issued by various publishers including The Times newspaper, the Oxford University Press and the Cambridge University Press . The Oxford University Press guidelines were originally drafted as a single broadsheet page by Horace Henry Hart, and were at the time (1893) the first guide of their type in English; they were gradually expanded and eventually published, first as Hart's Rules , and in 2002 as part of The Oxford Manual of Style . Comparable in authority and stature to The Chicago Manual of Style for published American English ,

4100-547: The Chambers Dictionary , and the Collins Dictionary record actual usage rather than attempting to prescribe it. In addition, vocabulary and usage change with time; words are freely borrowed from other languages and other varieties of English, and neologisms are frequent. For historical reasons dating back to the rise of London in the ninth century, the form of language spoken in London and

4264-532: The 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine , several NATO countries sent ground troops, warships and fighter aircraft to reinforce the alliance's eastern flank, and multiple countries again invoked Article 4. In March 2022, NATO leaders met at Brussels for an extraordinary summit which also involved Group of Seven and European Union leaders. NATO member states agreed to establish four additional battlegroups in Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, and Slovakia, and elements of

4428-744: The Army of the Republika Srpska , after the Srebrenica genocide . Further NATO air strikes helped bring the Yugoslav Wars to an end, resulting in the Dayton Agreement in November 1995. As part of this agreement, NATO deployed a UN-mandated peacekeeping force, under Operation Joint Endeavor , named IFOR . Almost 60,000 NATO troops were joined by forces from non-NATO countries in this peacekeeping mission. This transitioned into

4592-761: The Baltic Sea and the German border , it is a major seaport and Poland's seventh-largest city. As of 31 December 2022, the population was 391,566. Szczecin is located on the Oder River, south of the Szczecin Lagoon and the Bay of Pomerania . The city is situated along the southwestern shore of Dąbie Lake , on both sides of the Oder and on several large islands between the western and eastern branches of

4756-658: The Battle of Bornhöved in 1227, Szczecin was one of two bridgeheads remaining under Danish control (until 1235; Wolgast until 1241/43 or 1250). In the second half of the 12th century, a group of German tradesmen ("multus populus Teutonicorum" from various parts of the Holy Roman Empire) settled in the city around St.   Jacob's Church, which was donated in 1180 by Beringer, a trader from Bamberg , and consecrated in 1187. Hohenkrug (now in Szczecin Struga )

4920-643: The Belgian Congo be excluded from the treaty. French Algeria was, however, covered until its independence on 3 July 1962. Twelve of these thirty-two are original members who joined in 1949, while the other twenty joined in one of ten enlargement rounds. The three Nordic countries which joined NATO as founding members, Denmark, Iceland, and Norway, chose to limit their participation in three areas: there would be no permanent peacetime bases, no nuclear warheads and no Allied military activity (unless invited) permitted on their territory. However, Denmark allows

5084-1097: The Cold War , NATO operated as a check on the threat posed by the Soviet Union . The alliance remained in place after the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact , and has been involved in military operations in the Balkans , the Middle East , South Asia , and Africa . The organization's motto is animus in consulendo liber ( Latin for 'a mind unfettered in deliberation'). The organization's strategic concepts include deterrence . NATO's main headquarters are located in Brussels , Belgium, while NATO's military headquarters are near Mons , Belgium. The alliance has increased its NATO Response Force deployments in Eastern Europe, and

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5248-658: The East Midlands became standard English within the Court, and ultimately became the basis for generally accepted use in the law, government, literature and education in Britain. The standardisation of British English is thought to be from both dialect levelling and a thought of social superiority. Speaking in the Standard dialect created class distinctions; those who did not speak the standard English would be considered of

5412-522: The English language in England , or, more broadly, to the collective dialects of English throughout the British Isles taken as a single umbrella variety, for instance additionally incorporating Scottish English , Welsh English , and Northern Irish English . Tom McArthur in the Oxford Guide to World English acknowledges that British English shares "all the ambiguities and tensions [with]

5576-728: The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia . During the crisis, NATO also deployed one of its international reaction forces, the ACE Mobile Force (Land) , to Albania as the Albania Force (AFOR), to deliver humanitarian aid to refugees from Kosovo. The campaign was and has been criticized over its civilian casualties , including the bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade , and over whether it had legitimacy . The US,

5740-637: The Franco Prussian war of 1870–1871 , 1,700 French POWs were imprisoned there in deplorable conditions, resulting in the deaths of 600; after the Second World War monuments in their memory were built by the Polish authorities. Until 1873, Stettin remained a fortress. When part of the defensive structures were levelled, a new neighbourhood, Neustadt ("New Town") as well as water pipes, sewerage and drainage, and gas works were built to meet

5904-736: The German National People's Party (or DNVP) won most of the votes in the city, together winning 98,626 of 165,331 votes (59.3%), with the NSDAP getting 79,729 (47.9%) and the DNVP 18,897 (11.4%). In 1935, the Wehrmacht made Stettin the headquarters for Wehrkreis   II, which controlled the military units in all of Mecklenburg and Pomerania. It was also the area headquarters for units stationed at Stettin   I and II; Swinemünde ( Świnoujście ); Greifswald ; and Stralsund . In

6068-456: The Goražde safe area, resulting in the bombing of a Bosnian Serb military command outpost near Goražde by two US F-16 jets acting under NATO direction. In retaliation, Serbs took 150 U.N. personnel hostage on 14 April. On 16 April a British Sea Harrier was shot down over Goražde by Serb forces. In August 1995, a two-week NATO bombing campaign, Operation Deliberate Force , began against

6232-732: The Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean from Somali pirates , and help strengthen the navies and coast guards of regional states. During the Libyan Civil War , violence between protesters and the Libyan government under Colonel Muammar Gaddafi escalated, and on 17 March 2011 led to the passage of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973 , which called for a ceasefire, and authorized military action to protect civilians. A coalition that included several NATO members began enforcing

6396-640: The Iraq War and Syrian Civil War . At the 2014 Wales summit , the leaders of NATO's member states formally committed for the first time to spend the equivalent of at least two percent of their gross domestic products on defence by 2024, which had previously been only an informal guideline. At the 2016 Warsaw summit , NATO countries agreed on the creation of NATO Enhanced Forward Presence , which deployed four multinational battalion-sized battlegroups in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland. Before and during

6560-599: The NATO Response Force were activated for the first time in NATO's history. As of June 2022, NATO had deployed 40,000 troops along its 2,500-kilometre-long (1,550 mi) Eastern flank to deter Russian aggression. More than half of this number have been deployed in Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary, Slovakia, and Poland, which five countries muster a considerable combined ex-NATO force of 259,000 troops. To supplement Bulgaria's Air Force, Spain sent Eurofighter Typhoons ,

6724-629: The North Atlantic Alliance , is an intergovernmental military alliance of 32 member states —30 European and 2 North American. Established in the aftermath of World War II , the organization implements the North Atlantic Treaty , signed in Washington, D.C. , on 4 April 1949. NATO is a collective security system: its independent member states agree to defend each other against attacks by third parties. During

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6888-720: The North Atlantic Treaty to include member territory in Europe, North America, Turkey, and islands in the North Atlantic north of the Tropic of Cancer . Attacks on vessels, aircraft and other forces in the North Atlantic (again, north of the Tropic of Cancer) and the Mediterranean Sea may also provoke an Article 5 response. During the original treaty negotiations, the United States insisted that colonies such as

7052-423: The Northwestern Syria offensive , which involved Syrian and suspected Russian airstrikes on Turkish troops , and risked direct confrontation between Russia and a NATO member. The 32 NATO members are: NATO has thirty-two members, mostly in Europe with two in North America. NATO's "area of responsibility", within which attacks on member states are eligible for an Article 5 response, is defined under Article 6 of

7216-420: The Partnership for Peace and the Mediterranean Dialogue initiative in 1994, the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council in 1997, and the NATO–Russia Permanent Joint Council in 1998. At the 1999 Washington summit , Hungary , Poland , and the Czech Republic officially joined NATO, and the organization also issued new guidelines for membership with individualized " Membership Action Plans ". These plans governed

7380-421: The Royal Spanish Academy with Spanish. Standard British English differs notably in certain vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation features from standard American English and certain other standard English varieties around the world. British and American spelling also differ in minor ways. The accent, or pronunciation system, of standard British English, based in southeastern England, has been known for over

7544-439: The Scots language or Scottish Gaelic ). Each group includes a range of dialects, some markedly different from others. The various British dialects also differ in the words that they have borrowed from other languages. Around the middle of the 15th century, there were points where within the 5 major dialects there were almost 500 ways to spell the word though . Following its last major survey of English Dialects (1949–1950),

7708-451: The Second Northern War . Czarniecki, who led his forces to the city, is today mentioned in the Polish anthem , and numerous locations in the city honour his name. Wars inhibited the city's economic prosperity, which had undergone a deep crisis during the devastation of the Thirty Years' War and was further impeded by the new Swedish-Brandenburg-Prussian frontier, cutting Stettin off from its traditional Farther Pomeranian hinterland. Due to

7872-411: The Soviet occupation zone of Germany . The Soviet authorities had already appointed the German Communists Erich Spiegel and Erich Wiesner as mayors. Stettin is located mostly west of the Oder River, which was expected to become Poland's new western border, placing Stettin in East Germany. This would have been in accordance with the Potsdam Agreement between the victorious Allied powers, which envisaged

8036-420: The Syrian Civil War , after the downing of an unarmed Turkish F-4 reconnaissance jet , and after a mortar was fired at Turkey from Syria, and again in 2015 after threats by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant to its territorial integrity. In 2008 the United Nations Secretary-General called on member-states to protect the ships of Operation Allied Provider  [ de ; no ; ru ; uk ] , which

8200-415: The Syrian civil war . In April 2012, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan considered invoking Article 5 of the NATO treaty to protect Turkish national security in a dispute over the Syrian Civil War. The alliance responded quickly, and a spokesperson said the alliance was "monitoring the situation very closely and will continue to do so" and "takes it very seriously protecting its members." After

8364-410: The U.S. Space Force to maintain Pituffik Space Base , in Greenland. From the mid-1960s to the mid-1990s, France pursued a military strategy of independence from NATO under a policy dubbed "Gaullo-Mitterrandism". Nicolas Sarkozy negotiated the return of France to the integrated military command and the Defence Planning Committee in 2009, the latter being disbanded the following year. France remains

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8528-405: The United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 1199 on 23 September 1998 to demand a ceasefire. Negotiations under US Special Envoy Richard Holbrooke broke down on 23 March 1999, and he handed the matter to NATO, which acted on protecting regional security and started a 78-day bombing campaign on 24 March 1999. Operation Allied Force targeted the military capabilities of what was then

8692-417: The University of Leeds has started work on a new project. In May 2007 the Arts and Humanities Research Council awarded a grant to Leeds to study British regional dialects. The team are sifting through a large collection of examples of regional slang words and phrases turned up by the "Voices project" run by the BBC , in which they invited the public to send in examples of English still spoken throughout

8856-401: The Upper Saxon Circle of the Holy Roman Empire, the other two places being Leipzig and Berlin . Bogislaw XIV , who resided in Stettin beginning in 1620, became the sole ruler and Griffin duke when Philipp Julius, Duke of Pomerania died in 1625. Before the Thirty Years' War reached Pomerania, the city, as well as the entire duchy, declined economically due to the decrease in importance of

9020-553: The Vikings and Lechites erected strongholds in the vicinity. It subsequently served as the seat of the Dukes of Pomerania and the House of Griffin . In the course of the millennium, Szczecin under different names was part of Piast Poland , Denmark , Sweden , the Holy Roman Empire , Prussia , Germany and modern-day Poland. The city's architecture and cultural heritage reflects these periods, with excellent examples of Brick Gothic , Gründerzeit , Neoclassical , socialist realist and contemporary styles. The planned urban landscape

9184-457: The War of the Fourth Coalition , believing that he was facing a much larger force, and after receiving a threat of harsh treatment of the city, the Prussian commander Lieutenant General Friedrich von Romberg agreed to surrender the city to the French led by General Lasalle . In fact, Lasalle had only 800 men against von   Romberg's 5,300 men. In March 1809 Romberg was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment for giving up Stettin without

9348-502: The West Country and other near-by counties of the UK, the consonant R is not pronounced if not followed by a vowel, lengthening the preceding vowel instead. This phenomenon is known as non-rhoticity . In these same areas, a tendency exists to insert an R between a word ending in a vowel and a next word beginning with a vowel. This is called the intrusive R . It could be understood as a merger, in that words that once ended in an R and words that did not are no longer treated differently. This

9512-423: The Western Union . Talks for a wider military alliance, which could include North America, also began that month in the United States, where their foreign policy under the Truman Doctrine promoted international solidarity against actions they saw as communist aggression, such as the February 1948 coup d'état in Czechoslovakia . These talks resulted in the signature of the North Atlantic Treaty on 4 April 1949 by

9676-403: The collapse of the Afghan government as the greatest debacle that NATO has suffered since its founding. In August 2004, during the Iraq War , NATO formed the NATO Training Mission – Iraq , a training mission to assist the Iraqi security forces in conjunction with the US-led MNF-I . The NATO Training Mission-Iraq (NTM-I) was established at the request of the Iraqi Interim Government under

9840-429: The new border to be in "a line running from the Baltic Sea immediately west of Swinemünde, and thence along the Oder River[...]". Because of the returnees, the German population of the town swelled to 84,000. The mortality rate was at 20%, primarily due to starvation. However, Stettin and the mouth of the Oder River became Polish on 5   July 1945, as had been decided in a treaty signed on 26   July 1944 between

10004-455: The 12th century, the city became one of the more important and powerful seaports of the Baltic Sea. In a campaign in the winter of 1121–1122, Bolesław III Wrymouth , the Duke of Poland , gained control of the region, including the city of Szczecin and its stronghold. The Polish ruler initiated Christianization, entrusting this task to Otto of Bamberg , and the inhabitants were Christianised by two missions of Otto in 1124 and 1128. At this time,

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10168-554: The 1990s, the organization extended its activities into political and humanitarian situations that had not formerly been NATO concerns. During the breakup of Yugoslavia , the organization conducted its first military interventions in Bosnia from 1992 to 1995 and later Yugoslavia in 1999 . Politically, the organization sought better relations with the newly autonomous Central and Eastern European states, and diplomatic forums for regional cooperation between NATO and its neighbours were set up during this post-Cold War period, including

10332-422: The 21st century. RP, while long established as the standard English accent around the globe due to the spread of the British Empire , is distinct from the standard English pronunciation in some parts of the world; most prominently, RP notably contrasts with standard North American accents. In the 21st century, dictionaries like the Oxford English Dictionary , the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English ,

10496-474: The Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across the Continent". The city witnessed anti-communist revolts in 1956, 1970 and 1980. On August 30, 1980, first of the four August Agreements , which led to the first legalisation of the trade union Solidarity , was signed in Szczecin. The introduction of martial law in December 1981 met with a strike by the dockworkers of Szczecin shipyard, joined by other factories and workplaces in

10660-535: The Czech Republic officially joined, and NATO issued new guidelines for membership, with individualized " Membership Action Plans ". These plans governed the addition of new members: Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia in 2004, Albania and Croatia in 2009, Montenegro in 2017, and North Macedonia in 2020. Finland and Sweden are the newest members, joining on 4 April 2023 and 7 March 2024 respectively, spurred on by Russia's invasion of Ukraine . Ukraine's relationship with NATO began with

10824-424: The Early Middle Ages and the region became part of Poland in the 10th century. However, already Mieszko II Lambert (1025 ~ 1034) effectively lost control over the area and had to accept German suzerainty over the area of the Oder lagoon. Subsequent Polish rulers, the Holy Roman Empire, and the Liutician federation all aimed to control the territory. After the decline of the neighbouring regional centre Wolin in

10988-651: The English Language (1755) was a large step in the English-language spelling reform , where the purification of language focused on standardising both speech and spelling. By the early 20th century, British authors had produced numerous books intended as guides to English grammar and usage, a few of which achieved sufficient acclaim to have remained in print for long periods and to have been reissued in new editions after some decades. These include, most notably of all, Fowler's Modern English Usage and The Complete Plain Words by Sir Ernest Gowers . Detailed guidance on many aspects of writing British English for publication

11152-434: The Germanic schwein ) is the animal in the field bred by the occupied Anglo-Saxons and pork (like the French porc ) is the animal at the table eaten by the occupying Normans. Another example is the Anglo-Saxon cu meaning cow, and the French bœuf meaning beef. Cohabitation with the Scandinavians resulted in a significant grammatical simplification and lexical enrichment of the Anglo-Frisian core of English;

11316-417: The Hanseatic League and a conflict between Stettin and Frankfurt an der Oder . Following the Treaty of Stettin of 1630 , the town (along with most of Pomerania) was allied to and occupied by the Swedish Empire , which managed to keep the western parts of Pomerania after the death of Bogislaw   XIV in 1637. From the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, Stettin became the Capital of Swedish Pomerania. Stettin

11480-421: The ISAF mission throughout Afghanistan, and ISAF subsequently expanded the mission in four main stages over the whole of the country. On 31 July 2006, the ISAF additionally took over military operations in the south of Afghanistan from a US-led anti-terrorism coalition. Due to the intensity of the fighting in the south, in 2011 France allowed a squadron of Mirage 2000 fighter/attack aircraft to be moved into

11644-405: The Lion . In 1173, Szczecin castellan Wartislaw II , could not resist a Danish attack and became vassal of Denmark . In 1181, Bogusław became a vassal of the Holy Roman Empire. In 1185, Bogusław again became a Danish vassal. Despite falling under foreign suzerainty, local dukes maintained close ties with the fragmented Polish realm, and future Polish monarch Władysław III Spindleshanks stayed at

11808-527: The NATO–Ukraine Action Plan in 2002. In 2010, under President Viktor Yanukovych , Ukraine re-affirmed its non-aligned status and renounced aspirations of joining NATO. During the 2014 Ukrainian Revolution , Russia occupied Crimea and supported armed separatists in eastern Ukraine . As a result, in December 2014 Ukraine's parliament voted to end its non-aligned status, and in 2019 it enshrined

11972-585: The Nazis, who exaggerated the Polish activities to propagate an infiltration, led to the closing of the school. In 1938, the head of Szczecin's Union of Poles unit, Stanisław Borkowski, was imprisoned in Sachsenhausen concentration camp in Oranienburg, Germany . In 1939, all Polish organisations in Stettin were disbanded by the German authorities. Golisz and Omieczyński were murdered during the war. After

12136-549: The Netherlands sent eight F-35 attack aircraft, and additional French and US attack aircraft would arrive soon as well. No military operations were conducted by NATO during the Cold War. Following the end of the Cold War, the first operations, Anchor Guard in 1990 and Ace Guard in 1991, were prompted by the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait . Airborne early warning aircraft were sent to provide coverage of southeastern Turkey, and later

12300-486: The Oder River itself and the port of Szczecin, which remained under Soviet administration. The Oder River was handed over to Polish administration in September 1946, followed by the port between February 1946 and May 1954. While in 1945 the number of pre-war inhabitants dropped to 57,215 on 31 October 1945, the systematic expulsion of Germans started on 22 February 1946 and continued until late 1947, in accordance with

12464-922: The Oxford Manual is a fairly exhaustive standard for published British English that writers can turn to in the absence of specific guidance from their publishing house. British English is the basis of, and very similar to, Commonwealth English . Commonwealth English is English as spoken and written in the Commonwealth countries , though often with some local variation. This includes English spoken in Australia , Malta , New Zealand , Nigeria , and South Africa . It also includes South Asian English used in South Asia, in English varieties in Southeast Asia , and in parts of Africa. Canadian English

12628-698: The Potsdam Agreement. In December 1946 about 17,000 German inhabitants remained, while the number of Poles living in the city reached 100,000. To ease the tensions between settlers from different regions, and help overcome fear caused by the continued presence of the Soviet troops, a special event was organised in April 1946 with 50,000 visitors in the partly destroyed city centre. Settlers from Central Poland made up about 70% of Szczecin's new population. In addition to Poles, Ukrainians from Polish areas annexed by

12792-732: The Prussian administration. Only after the Prussian Edict of Emancipation of 11   March 1812, which granted Prussian citizenship to all Jews living in the kingdom, did a Jewish community emerge in Stettin, with the first Jews settling in the town in 1814. Construction of a synagogue started in 1834; the community also owned a religious and a secular school, an orphanage since 1855, and a retirement home since 1893. The Jewish community had between 1,000 and 1,200 members by 1873 and between 2,800 and 3,000 members by 1927–28. These numbers dropped to 2,701 in 1930 and to 2,322 in late 1934. After

12956-712: The South East, there are significantly different accents; the Cockney accent spoken by some East Londoners is strikingly different from Received Pronunciation (RP). Cockney rhyming slang can be (and was initially intended to be) difficult for outsiders to understand, although the extent of its use is often somewhat exaggerated. Londoners speak with a mixture of accents, depending on ethnicity, neighbourhood, class, age, upbringing, and sundry other factors. Estuary English has been gaining prominence in recent decades: it has some features of RP and some of Cockney. Immigrants to

13120-588: The Soviet Union settled there. Also Poles repatriated from Harbin , China and Greeks , refugees of the Greek Civil War , settled in Szczecin in the following years. In 1945 and 1946, the city was the starting point of the northern route used by the Jewish underground organisation Brichah to channel Jewish displaced persons from Central and Eastern Europe to the American occupation zone . Szczecin

13284-655: The Soviet Union and the Soviet-controlled Polish Committee of National Liberation (PKWN) (also known as "the Lublin Poles", as contrasted with the London -based Polish government-in-exile ). On 4   October 1945, the decisive land border of Poland was established west of the 1945 line, and the city was renamed to its historic Polish name Szczecin, but the area excluded the Police area,

13448-598: The UK in recent decades have brought many more languages to the country and particularly to London. Surveys started in 1979 by the Inner London Education Authority discovered over 125 languages being spoken domestically by the families of the inner city's schoolchildren. Notably Multicultural London English , a sociolect that emerged in the late 20th century spoken mainly by young, working-class people in multicultural parts of London . Since

13612-490: The UK, and most other NATO countries opposed efforts to require the UN Security Council to approve NATO military strikes, such as the action against Serbia in 1999, while France and some others claimed that the alliance needed UN approval. The US/UK side claimed that this would undermine the authority of the alliance, and they noted that Russia and China would have exercised their Security Council vetoes to block

13776-640: The United Kingdom , as well as within the countries themselves. The major divisions are normally classified as English English (or English as spoken in England (which is itself broadly grouped into Southern English , West Country , East and West Midlands English and Northern English ), Northern Irish English (in Northern Ireland), Welsh English (not to be confused with the Welsh language ), and Scottish English (not to be confused with

13940-499: The United Kingdom, and the United States. Four new members joined during the Cold War: Greece (1952), Turkey (1952), West Germany (1955) and Spain (1982). Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union , many former Warsaw Pact and post-Soviet states sought membership. In 1990, the territory of the former East Germany was added with the reunification of Germany . At the 1999 Washington summit , Hungary, Poland, and

14104-440: The United States and Germany were the biggest contributors with 16.2% each. Member states pay for and maintain their own troops and equipment. They contribute to NATO operations and missions by committing troops and equipment on a voluntary basis. Since 2006, the goal has been for each country to spend at least 2 percent of its gross domestic product on its own defence; in 2014, a NATO declaration said that countries not meeting

14268-465: The West Scottish accent. Phonological features characteristic of British English revolve around the pronunciation of the letter R, as well as the dental plosive T and some diphthongs specific to this dialect. Once regarded as a Cockney feature, in a number of forms of spoken British English, /t/ has become commonly realised as a glottal stop [ʔ] when it is in the intervocalic position, in

14432-532: The Western Union's military structures and plans, including their agreements on standardizing equipment and agreements on stationing foreign military forces in European countries. In 1952, the post of Secretary General of NATO was established as the organization's chief civilian. That year also saw the first major NATO maritime exercises , Exercise Mainbrace and the accession of Greece and Turkey to

14596-410: The adjective little is predominant elsewhere. Nevertheless, there is a meaningful degree of uniformity in written English within the United Kingdom, and this could be described by the term British English . The forms of spoken English, however, vary considerably more than in most other areas of the world where English is spoken and so a uniform concept of British English is more difficult to apply to

14760-405: The agricultural industry. According to German police reports from 1940, 15,000 Polish slave workers lived within the city. During the war, 135 forced labour camps for slave workers were established in the city. Most of the 25,000 slave workers were Poles, but Czechs , Italians , Frenchmen and Belgians , as well as Dutch citizens, were also enslaved in the camps. A Nazi prison was also operated in

14924-623: The alliance also mounted Operation Essential Harvest , a mission disarming ethnic Albanian militias in the Republic of Macedonia. As of 2023 , around 4,500 KFOR soldiers, representing 27 countries, continue to operate in the area. The September 11 attacks in the United States caused NATO to invoke Article 5 of the NATO Charter for the first time in the organization's history. The Article states that an attack on any member shall be considered to be an attack on all. The invocation

15088-524: The alliance between the two rulers. Szczecin was part of the federation of Wendish towns , a predecessor of the Hanseatic League , in 1283. The city prospered due to its participation in the Baltic Sea trade, primarily with herring , grain, and timber; craftsmanship also prospered, and more than forty guilds were established in the city. The far-reaching autonomy granted by the House of Griffins

15252-401: The alliance on 7 March 2024. In addition, NATO recognizes Bosnia and Herzegovina , Georgia , and Ukraine as aspiring members. Enlargement has led to tensions with non-member Russia , one of the 18 additional countries participating in NATO's Partnership for Peace programme. Another nineteen countries are involved in institutionalized dialogue programmes with NATO. The Treaty of Dunkirk

15416-545: The area of Stettin. The city itself was covered by the Home Army's "Bałtyk" structure, and Polish resistance infiltrated Stettin's naval yards. Other activities of the resistance consisted of smuggling people to Sweden. The Soviet Red Army captured the city on 26   April 1945. While the majority of the almost 400,000 inhabitants had left the city, between 6,000 and 20,000 inhabitants remained in late April. On 28 April 1945 Polish authorities tried to gain control, but in

15580-627: The area, to Kandahar , in order to reinforce the alliance's efforts. During its 2012 Chicago Summit , NATO endorsed a plan to end the Afghanistan war and to remove the NATO-led ISAF Forces by the end of December 2014. ISAF was disestablished in December 2014 and replaced by the follow-on training Resolute Support Mission . On 14 April 2021, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said the alliance had agreed to start withdrawing its troops from Afghanistan by 1 May. Soon after

15744-488: The award of the grant in 2007, Leeds University stated: that they were "very pleased"—and indeed, "well chuffed"—at receiving their generous grant. He could, of course, have been "bostin" if he had come from the Black Country , or if he was a Scouser he would have been well "made up" over so many spondoolicks, because as a Geordie might say, £460,000 is a "canny load of chink". Most people in Britain speak with

15908-546: The ban on 12 April 1993 with Operation Deny Flight . From June 1993 until October 1996, Operation Sharp Guard added maritime enforcement of the arms embargo and economic sanctions against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia . On 28 February 1994, NATO took its first wartime action by shooting down four Bosnian Serb aircraft violating the no-fly zone. On 10 and 11 April 1994, the United Nations Protection Force called in air strikes to protect

16072-585: The charter, the Slavs were put under Germanic jurisdiction. When Barnim granted Szczecin Magdeburg rights in 1243, part of the Slavic settlement was reconstructed. The duke had to promise to level the burgh in 1249. Most Slavic inhabitants were resettled to two new suburbs north and south of the town. In 1249, Barnim I also granted equivalent Magdeburg town privileges to the town of Damm (also known as Altdamm) on

16236-425: The city of its right to administrative autonomy, abolished guild privileges as well as its status as a staple town, and subsidised manufacturers. Also, colonists were settled in the city, primarily French Huguenots . The French established a prosperous community, greatly contributed to the city's economic revival, and were treated with reluctance by the German burghers and city authorities. In October 1806, during

16400-464: The city's ship works began the construction of the pre-dreadnought battleship Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse . In 1914, before World War   I, the Polish community in the city numbered over 3,000 people, contributing about 2% of the population. These were primarily industrial workers and their families who came from the Poznań (Posen) area and a few local wealthy industrialists and merchants. Among them

16564-618: The city, with forced labour subcamps in the region. In February 1940, the Jews of Stettin were deported to the Lublin reservation . International press reports emerged, describing how the Nazis forced Jews, regardless of age, condition and gender, to sign away all property and loaded them onto trains headed to the camp, escorted by members of the SA and SS . Due to publicity given to the event, German institutions ordered such future actions to be made in

16728-629: The collapse of the Warsaw Pact in February 1991 and the dissolution of the Soviet Union that December, which removed the de facto main adversaries of NATO. This began a drawdown of military spending and equipment in Europe. The CFE treaty allowed signatories to remove 52,000 pieces of conventional armaments in the following sixteen years, and allowed military spending by NATO's European members to decline by 28 percent from 1990 to 2015. In 1990, several Western leaders gave assurances to Mikhail Gorbachev that NATO would not expand further east, as revealed by memoranda of private conversations. In

16892-590: The combined militaries of all NATO members include around 3.5 million soldiers and personnel. All member states together cover an area of 25.07 million km (9.68 million sq. mi.) with a population of about 973 million people. Their combined military spending as of 2022 constituted around 55 percent of the global nominal total . Moreover, members have agreed to reach or maintain the target defence spending of at least two percent of their GDP by 2024. NATO formed with twelve founding members and has added new members ten times, most recently when Sweden joined

17056-478: The country's southeast . Georgia was promised "future membership" during the 2008 summit in Bucharest, but US president Barack Obama said in 2014 that the country was not "currently on a path" to membership. Russia continued to politically oppose further expansion, seeing it as inconsistent with informal understandings between Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and European and US negotiators that allowed for

17220-622: The country. The BBC Voices project also collected hundreds of news articles about how the British speak English from swearing through to items on language schools. This information will also be collated and analysed by Johnson's team both for content and for where it was reported. "Perhaps the most remarkable finding in the Voices study is that the English language is as diverse as ever, despite our increased mobility and constant exposure to other accents and dialects through TV and radio". When discussing

17384-695: The defeat of Nazi Germany, a street was named after Golisz. According to German historian Jan Musekamp, the activities of the Polish pre-war organizations were exaggerated after World War II for propaganda purposes. During World War II , Stettin was the base for the German 2nd Motorised Infantry Division , which cut across the Polish Corridor and was later used in 1940 as an embarkation point for Operation Weserübung , Germany's assault on Denmark and Norway . On 15 October 1939, neighbouring municipalities were joined to Stettin, creating Groß-Stettin, with about 380,000 inhabitants, in 1940. The city had become

17548-546: The demands of the growing population. Stettin developed into a major Prussian port and became part of the German Empire in 1871. While most of the province retained its agrarian character, Stettin was industrialised , and its population rose from 27,000 in 1813 to 210,000 in 1900 and 255,500 in 1925. Major industries that flourished in Stettin from 1840 were shipbuilding, chemical and food industries, and machinery construction. Starting in 1843, Stettin became connected to

17712-481: The demise of NATO. The German foreign ministry pointed to "a considerable [German] contribution to NATO and NATO-led operations" and to the fact that this engagement was highly valued by President Obama. While the mission was extended into September, Norway that day (10 June) announced it would begin scaling down contributions and complete withdrawal by 1 August. Earlier that week it was reported Danish air fighters were running out of bombs. The following week,

17876-552: The eastern bank of the Oder. Damm merged with neighbouring Szczecin on 15   October 1939 and is now the Dąbie neighbourhood. This town had been built on the site of a former Pomeranian burg, "Vadam" or "Dambe", which Boleslaw had destroyed during his 1121 campaign. On 2 December 1261, Barnim I allowed Jewish settlement in Szczecin in accordance with the Magdeburg law, in a privilege renewed in 1308 and 1371. The Jewish Jordan family

18040-599: The first Christian church of Ss Peter and Paul was erected. The Poles' minted coins were commonly used in trade in this period. The population of the city at that time is estimated to be at around 5,000–9,000 people. Polish rule ended with Boleslaw's death in 1138. During the Wendish Crusade in 1147, a contingent led by the German margrave Albert the Bear , an enemy of Slavic presence in the region, papal legate, bishop Anselm of Havelberg and Konrad of Meissen besieged

18204-547: The first time in NATO's history that it took charge of a mission outside the north Atlantic area. ISAF was initially charged with securing Kabul and surrounding areas from the Taliban , al Qaeda and factional warlords, so as to allow for the establishment of the Afghan Transitional Administration headed by Hamid Karzai . In October 2003, the UN Security Council authorized the expansion of

18368-540: The following month, the Polish administration was twice forced to leave. The reason for this was, according to Polish sources, that the Western Allies raised protest against the Soviet and Polish policy of creating a fait-accomplit in Eastern Germany . Finally the permanent handover occurred on 5   July 1945. In the meantime, part of the German population had returned, believing it might become part of

18532-661: The goal of NATO membership in the Constitution . At the June 2021 Brussels Summit , NATO leaders affirmed that Ukraine would eventually join the Alliance, and supported Ukraine's right to self-determination without interference. In late 2021, there was another massive Russian military buildup near Ukraine's borders. On 30 November, Russian president Putin said Ukraine joining NATO, and the deployment of missile defense systems or long-range missiles in Ukraine, would be crossing

18696-572: The goal would "aim to move towards the 2 percent guideline within a decade". In July 2022, NATO estimated that 11 members would meet the target in 2023. On 14 February 2024, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that 18 member states would meet the 2% target in 2024. On 17 June 2024, prior to the 2024 Washington summit , Stoltenberg updated that figure and announced that a record 23 of 32 NATO member states were meeting their defense spending targets of 2% of their country's GDP. NATO added that defense spending for European member states and Canada

18860-481: The guild of tailors added a Wendenparagraph to its statutes, banning Slavs. While not as heavily affected by medieval witchhunts as other regions of the empire, there are reports of the burning of three women and one man convicted of witchcraft in 1538. In 1570, during the reign of John Frederick, Duke of Pomerania , a congress was held at Stettin ending the Northern Seven Years' War . During

19024-936: The head of the Royal Navy said the country's operations in the conflict were not sustainable. By the end of the mission in October 2011, after the death of Colonel Gaddafi, NATO planes had flown about 9,500 strike sorties against pro-Gaddafi targets. A report from the organization Human Rights Watch in May 2012 identified at least 72 civilians killed in the campaign. Following a coup d'état attempt in October 2013, Libyan Prime Minister Ali Zeidan requested technical advice and trainers from NATO to assist with ongoing security issues. Use of Article 5 has been threatened multiple times and four out of seven official Article 4 consultations have been called due to spillover in Turkey from

19188-458: The idea of two different morphemes, one that causes the double negation, and one that is used for the point or the verb. Standard English in the United Kingdom, as in other English-speaking nations, is widely enforced in schools and by social norms for formal contexts but not by any singular authority; for instance, there is no institution equivalent to the Académie française with French or

19352-512: The immediate coast and the summers are warm, but still with some moderation, especially due to the Baltic Sea . The average air temperature in Szczecin ranges from 8 to 8.4 °C. The hottest month is July with a temperature of 15.8 °C to 20.3 °C, the coldest January from -4.1 °C to 2.6 °C. Air temperature below 0 °C occurs on average over 86 days a year, most frequently in January and February. The average annual rainfall

19516-528: The interwar period, the Polish minority numbered 2,000 people, less than 1% of the city's population at that time. A number of Poles were members of the Union of Poles in Germany (ZPN), which was active in the city from 1924. A Polish consulate was located in the city between 1925 and 1939. On the initiative of the consulate and ZPN activist Maksymilian Golisz, a number of Polish institutions were established, e.g.,

19680-523: The last southern Midlands accent to use the broad "a" in words like bath or grass (i.e. barth or grarss ). Conversely crass or plastic use a slender "a". A few miles northwest in Leicestershire the slender "a" becomes more widespread generally. In the town of Corby , five miles (8 km) north, one can find Corbyite which, unlike the Kettering accent, is largely influenced by

19844-462: The later Norman occupation led to the grafting onto that Germanic core of a more elaborate layer of words from the Romance branch of the European languages. This Norman influence entered English largely through the courts and government. Thus, English developed into a "borrowing" language of great flexibility and with a huge vocabulary . Dialects and accents vary amongst the four countries of

20008-579: The local court of Duke Bogusław I in 1186, on behalf of his father, Duke of Greater Poland Mieszko III the Old , who also periodically was the High Duke of Poland . Following a conflict between his heirs and Canute VI of Denmark , the settlement was destroyed in 1189, but the fortress was reconstructed and manned with a Danish force in 1190. While the empire restored its superiority over the Duchy of Pomerania in

20172-570: The major German and Pomeranian cities by railways, and the water connection to the Bay of Pomerania was enhanced by the construction of the Kaiserfahrt (now Piast) canal. The city was also a scientific centre; for example, it was home to the Entomological Society of Stettin . On 20 October 1890, some of the city's Poles created the "Society of Polish-Catholic Workers" in the city, one of the first Polish organisations. In 1897,

20336-457: The mass internal migration to Northamptonshire in the 1940s and given its position between several major accent regions, it has become a source of various accent developments. In Northampton the older accent has been influenced by overspill Londoners. There is an accent known locally as the Kettering accent, which is a transitional accent between the East Midlands and East Anglian . It is

20500-537: The member states of the Western Union plus the United States, Canada, Portugal, Italy, Norway, Denmark, and Iceland. Canadian diplomat Lester B. Pearson was a key author and drafter of the treaty. The North Atlantic Treaty was largely dormant until the Korean War initiated the establishment of NATO to implement it with an integrated military structure. This included the formation of Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE) in 1951, which adopted many of

20664-463: The modern period, but due to their remoteness from the Germanic languages , influence on English was notably limited . However, the degree of influence remains debated, and it has recently been argued that its grammatical influence accounts for the substantial innovations noted between English and the other West Germanic languages. Initially, Old English was a diverse group of dialects, reflecting

20828-520: The no-fly zone from the initial coalition, while command of targeting ground units remained with the coalition's forces. NATO began officially enforcing the UN resolution on 27 March 2011 with assistance from Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. By June, reports of divisions within the alliance surfaced as only eight of the 28 member states were participating in combat operations, resulting in

20992-496: The only NATO member outside the Nuclear Planning Group and, unlike the United States and the United Kingdom, will not commit its nuclear-armed submarines to the alliance. NATO was established on 4 April 1949 by the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty (Washington Treaty). The 12 founding members of the alliance were Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal,

21156-584: The organization. Following the London and Paris Conferences , West Germany was permitted to rearm militarily, as they joined NATO in May 1955, which was, in turn, a major factor in the creation of the Soviet-dominated Warsaw Pact , delineating the two opposing sides of the Cold War . The building of the Berlin Wall in 1961 marked a height in Cold War tensions, when 400,000 US troops were stationed in Europe. Doubts over

21320-511: The origin of the name, including derivations from either: an Old Slavic word for 'hill peak' (Polish: szczyt ), the plant fuller's teasel (Polish: szczeć ), or the personal name Szczota . Other medieval names for the town are Burstaborg (in the Knytlinga saga ) and Burstenburgh (in the Annals of Waldemar). These names, which literally mean 'brush burgh', are likely derived from

21484-502: The provisions of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1546 . The aim of NTM-I was to assist in the development of Iraqi security forces training structures and institutions so that Iraq can build an effective and sustainable capability that addresses the needs of the country. NTM-I was not a combat mission but is a distinct mission, under the political control of the North Atlantic Council . Its operational emphasis

21648-694: The river. It is also surrounded by dense forests, shrubland and heaths , chiefly the Wkrzańska Heath shared with Germany (Ueckermünde) and the Szczecin Landscape Park . Szczecin is adjacent to the town of Police and is the urban centre of the Szczecin agglomeration , an extended metropolitan area that includes communities in the German states of Brandenburg and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania . The city's recorded history dates back over 1,300 years, when diverse tribes and peoples such as

21812-494: The security of shipping in general, which began on 4 October 2001. The alliance showed unity: on 16 April 2003, NATO agreed to take command of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), which included troops from 42 countries. The decision came at the request of Germany and the Netherlands, the two countries leading ISAF at the time of the agreement, and all nineteen NATO ambassadors approved it unanimously. The handover of control to NATO took place on 11 August, and marked

21976-538: The see of the Szczecin-Kamień Catholic Archdiocese . From 1999 onwards, Szczecin has served as the site of the headquarters of NATO 's Multinational Corps Northeast . The city was a candidate for the European Capital of Culture in 2016. Szczecin and Stettin are the Polish and German equivalents of the same name, which is of Proto-Slavic origin, though the exact etymology is the subject of ongoing research. In her Etymological Dictionary of Geographical Names of Poland , Maria Malec lists 11 theories regarding

22140-525: The shooting down of a Turkish military jet by Syria in June 2012 and Syrian forces shelling Turkish cities in October 2012 resulting in two Article 4 consultations, NATO approved Operation Active Fence . In the past decade the conflict has only escalated. In response to the 2015 Suruç bombing , which Turkey attributed to ISIS , and other security issues along its southern border, Turkey called for an emergency meeting . The latest consultation happened in February 2020, as part of increasing tensions due to

22304-428: The smaller SFOR , which started with 32,000 troops initially and ran from December 1996 until December 2004, when operations were then passed onto the European Union Force Althea . Following the lead of its member states, NATO began to award a service medal, the NATO Medal , for these operations. In an effort to stop Slobodan Milošević 's Serbian-led crackdown on KLA separatists and Albanian civilians in Kosovo ,

22468-401: The spoken language. Globally, countries that are former British colonies or members of the Commonwealth tend to follow British English, as is the case for English used by European Union institutions. In China, both British English and American English are taught. The UK government actively teaches and promotes English around the world and operates in over 200 countries . English is

22632-456: The strength of the relationship between the European states and the United States ebbed and flowed, along with doubts over the credibility of the NATO defence against a prospective Soviet invasion – doubts that led to the development of the independent French nuclear deterrent and the withdrawal of France from NATO's military structure in 1966. In 1982, the newly democratic Spain joined the alliance. The Revolutions of 1989 in Europe led to

22796-405: The strike on Yugoslavia , and could do the same in future conflicts where NATO intervention was required, thus nullifying the entire potency and purpose of the organization. Recognizing the post-Cold War military environment, NATO adopted the Alliance Strategic Concept during its Washington summit in April 1999 that emphasized conflict prevention and crisis management. Milošević finally accepted

22960-555: The subsequent addition of new alliance members. Article 5 of the North Atlantic treaty , requiring member states to come to the aid of any member state subject to an armed attack, was invoked for the first and only time after the September 11 attacks , after which troops were deployed to Afghanistan under the NATO-led ISAF . The organization has operated a range of additional roles since then, including sending trainers to Iraq , assisting in counter-piracy operations . The election of French president Nicolas Sarkozy in 2007 led to

23124-403: The terms of an international peace plan on 3 June 1999, ending the Kosovo War . On 11 June, Milošević further accepted UN resolution 1244 , under the mandate of which NATO then helped establish the KFOR peacekeeping force. Nearly one million refugees had fled Kosovo, and part of KFOR's mandate was to protect the humanitarian missions, in addition to deterring violence. In August–September 2001,

23288-433: The theft of work tools worth £500 from a van at the Sprucefield park and ride car park in Lisburn. A football team can be treated likewise: Arsenal have lost just one of 20 home Premier League matches against Manchester City. This tendency can be observed in texts produced already in the 19th century. For example, Jane Austen , a British author, writes in Chapter 4 of Pride and Prejudice , published in 1813: All

23452-404: The third-largest German city by area, after Berlin and Hamburg. As the war started, the number of non-Germans in the city increased as slave workers were brought in. The first transports came in 1939 from Bydgoszcz , Toruń and Łódź . They were mainly used in a synthetic silk factory near Stettin. The next wave of slave workers was brought in 1940, in addition to PoWs who were used for work in

23616-427: The town. There, a Polish contingent supplied by Mieszko III the Old joined the crusaders. However, the citizens had placed crosses around the fortifications, indicating they already had been Christianised. Duke Ratibor I of Pomerania , negotiated the disbanding of the crusading forces. After the Battle of Verchen in 1164, Szczecin duke Bogusław I, Duke of Pomerania became a vassal of the Duchy of Saxony's Henry

23780-403: The traditional accent of Newcastle upon Tyne , 'out' will sound as 'oot', and in parts of Scotland and North-West England, 'my' will be pronounced as 'me'. Long vowels /iː/ and /uː/ are diphthongised to [ɪi] and [ʊu] respectively (or, more technically, [ʏʉ], with a raised tongue), so that ee and oo in feed and food are pronounced with a movement. The diphthong [oʊ] is also pronounced with

23944-440: The translation of the city's Slavic name (assuming derivation No. 2 for that). The recorded history of Szczecin began in the eighth century, when Vikings and West Slavs settled in Pomerania . The West Slavs, or Lechites , erected a new stronghold on the site of the modern castle . Since the 9th century, the stronghold was fortified and expanded toward the Oder bank . Mieszko I of Poland took control of Pomerania during

24108-577: The varied origins of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England. One of these dialects, Late West Saxon , eventually came to dominate. The original Old English was then influenced by two waves of invasion: the first was by speakers of the Scandinavian branch of the Germanic family, who settled in parts of Britain in the eighth and ninth centuries; the second was the Normans in the 11th century, who spoke Old Norman and ultimately developed an English variety of this called Anglo-Norman . These two invasions caused English to become "mixed" to some degree (though it

24272-465: The war, Stettin had tended to side with Denmark , while Stralsund tended toward Sweden  – as a whole, however, the Duchy of Pomerania tried to maintain neutrality. Nevertheless, a Landtag that had met in Stettin in 1563 introduced a sixfold rise in real estate taxes to finance the raising of a mercenary army for the duchy's defence. Johann Friedrich also succeeded in elevating Stettin to one of only three places allowed to coin money in

24436-415: The withdrawal of NATO troops started, the Taliban launched an offensive against the Afghan government , quickly advancing in front of collapsing Afghan Armed Forces . By 15 August 2021, Taliban militants controlled the vast majority of Afghanistan and had encircled the capital city of Kabul . Some politicians in NATO member states have described the chaotic withdrawal of Western troops from Afghanistan and

24600-402: The word 'British' and as a result can be used and interpreted in two ways, more broadly or more narrowly, within a range of blurring and ambiguity". Variations exist in formal (both written and spoken) English in the United Kingdom. For example, the adjective wee is almost exclusively used in parts of Scotland, north-east England, Northern Ireland, Ireland, and occasionally Yorkshire , whereas

24764-501: The world are good and agreeable in your eyes. However, in Chapter 16, the grammatical number is used. The world is blinded by his fortune and consequence. Some dialects of British English use negative concords, also known as double negatives . Rather than changing a word or using a positive, words like nobody, not, nothing, and never would be used in the same sentence. While this does not occur in Standard English, it does occur in non-standard dialects. The double negation follows

24928-428: Was Kazimierz Pruszak, director of the Gollnow industrial works and a Polish patriot, who predicted the eventual "return" of Szczecin to Poland. During the interwar period , Stettin was Weimar Germany 's largest port on the Baltic Sea, and her third-largest port after Hamburg and Bremen . Cars of the Stoewer automobile company were produced in Stettin from 1899 to 1945. By 1939, the Reichsautobahn Berlin –Stettin

25092-492: Was based on the Orion constellation , with avenues, roundabouts and extensive parkland. The city's chief landmarks include the Szczecin Cathedral , the Ducal Castle , the National Museum and the Szczecin Philharmonic . Szczecin is the administrative and industrial centre of West Pomeranian Voivodeship and is the site of the University of Szczecin , Pomeranian Medical University , Maritime University , West Pomeranian University of Technology , Szczecin Art Academy , and

25256-430: Was completed. Stettin played a major role as an entrepôt in the development of the Scottish herring trade with the Continent, peaking at an annual export of more than 400,000 barrels in 1885, 1894 and 1898. Trade flourished until the outbreak of the First World War and resumed on a reduced scale during the years between the wars. In the March 1933 German elections to the Reichstag, the Nazis and German nationalists from

25420-410: Was confirmed on 4 October 2001 when NATO determined that the attacks were indeed eligible under the terms of the North Atlantic Treaty. The eight official actions taken by NATO in response to the attacks included Operation Eagle Assist and Operation Active Endeavour , a naval operation in the Mediterranean Sea designed to prevent the movement of terrorists or weapons of mass destruction, and to enhance

25584-448: Was distributing aid as part of the World Food Programme mission in Somalia. The North Atlantic Council and other countries, including Russia, China and South Korea, formed Operation Ocean Shield . The operation sought to dissuade and interrupt pirate attacks, protect vessels, and to increase the general level of security in the region. Beginning on 17 August 2009, NATO deployed warships in an operation to protect maritime traffic in

25748-466: Was granted citizenship in 1325, but none of the 22 Jews allowed to settle in the duchy in 1481 lived in the city, and in 1492, all Jews in the duchy were ordered to convert to Christianity or leave – this order remained effective throughout the rest of the Griffin era. In 1273, in Szczecin duke of Poznań and future King of Poland Przemysł II married princess Ludgarda , granddaughter of Barnim I, Duke of Pomerania , in order to strengthen

25912-510: Was in part reduced when the dukes reclaimed Stettin as their main residence in the late 15th century. The anti-Slavic policies of German merchants and craftsmen intensified in this period, resulting in measures such as bans on people of Slavic descent joining craft guilds, a doubling of customs tax for Slavic merchants, and bans against public usage of their native language. The more prosperous Slavic citizens were forcibly stripped of their possessions, which were then handed over to Germans. In 1514,

26076-422: Was never a truly mixed language in the strictest sense of the word; mixed languages arise from the cohabitation of speakers of different languages, who develop a hybrid tongue for basic communication). The more idiomatic, concrete and descriptive English is, the more it is from Anglo-Saxon origins. The more intellectual and abstract English is, the more it contains Latin and French influences, e.g. swine (like

26240-411: Was on training and mentoring. The activities of the mission were coordinated with Iraqi authorities and the US-led Deputy Commanding General Advising and Training, who was also dual-hatted as the Commander of NTM-I. The mission officially concluded on 17 December 2011. Turkey invoked the first Article 4 meetings in 2003 at the start of the Iraq War . Turkey also invoked this article twice in 2012 during

26404-431: Was rebuilt, and the city's industry was expanded. At the same time, Szczecin became a major Polish industrial centre and an important seaport (particularly for Silesian coal) for Poland, Czechoslovakia and East Germany . Cultural expansion was accompanied by a campaign resulting in the "removal of all German traces". In 1946, Winston Churchill prominently mentioned the city in his Iron Curtain speech: "From Stettin in

26568-413: Was signed by France and the United Kingdom on 4 March 1947, during the aftermath of World War II and the start of the Cold War , as a Treaty of Alliance and Mutual Assistance in the event of possible attacks by Germany or the Soviet Union . In March 1948, this alliance was expanded in the Treaty of Brussels to include the Benelux countries, forming the Brussels Treaty Organization, commonly known as

26732-421: Was the first village in the Duchy of Pomerania that was clearly recorded as German ( villa teutonicorum ) in 1173. Ostsiedlung accelerated in Pomerania during the 13th century. Duke Barnim I of Pomerania granted Szczecin a local government charter in 1237, separating the German settlement from the Slavic community settled around the St. Nicholas Church in the neighbourhood of Kessin ( Polish : Chyzin ). In

26896-451: Was turned into a major Swedish fortress, which was repeatedly besieged in subsequent wars. The next Treaty of Stettin (1653) did not change this, but due to the downfall of the Swedish Empire after Charles XII , the city went to Prussia in 1720. Instead Stralsund became capital of the last remaining parts of Swedish Pomerania 1720–1815. The city was on the path of Polish forces led by Hetman Stefan Czarniecki moving from Denmark during

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