partnership for peace or succour for despots?
Key Points:
NATO has been engaged in the Middle East and North Africa for over 16 years through a little known partnership programme known as the Mediterranean Dialogue (MD) and the more recent Istanbul Cooperation Initiative (ICI)
NATO recently announced an extension in its MD/ICI cooperation “toolbox” from around 700 to more than 1600 “activities”. These activities range from ordinary military contact to exchanges of information on maritime security and counter-terrorism, access to educational programmes provided by Alliance institutions, and joint crisis management exercises. However, while 2008-09 versions of the toolbox were published for the first time in June 2010, what each country takes from it remains secret.
The lack of transparency makes it very difficult to evaluate the impact of these security relationships on the Arab Spring.
In the early years, the dialogue consisted mainly of low-key bilateral meetings at NATO headquarters between officials and representatives from Mediterranean states. A lack of funding from the NATO side, lack of more substantial military input to the dialogue from both sides, and a continuing sense that the process lacked overall direction and a clear sense of purpose were key constraints.
The ‘complementary’ ICI was created in 2004, at the suggestion of the United States, to involve Middle Eastern states in future NATO missions, although both the MD and ICI have remained relatively marginal processes in internal NATO debates, as well as in terms of actual co-operative activity.
The new Strategic Concept adopted in Lisbon in November 2010 acknowledged the importance of partnerships in general and indicated that a fresh impetus would be given to the MD/ICI.
Conclusions:
The MD/ICI throughout its relatively short history has predominantly focused on the interests and security agendas of the Alliance, rather than those of the partner states. The human security concerns of the people in the region were of even lower order of priority. Hence, the events taking place in the Middle East are happening not because of NATO policy but despite it.
Divisions within NATO continue to hamper a consensual and constructive response to the Arab Spring.
There is very little information in the public domain on the extent of NATO’s cooperation with individual countries under the MD and ICI initiatives. Any future NATO security sector reform assistance in the region should be subject to proper scrutiny, oversight and independent evaluation.
NATO’s renewed policy of partnership will only appear reliable to the ‘Arab street’ if it is consistent, sustained and views reform as the key issue on the agenda.