NATO Foreign Ministers’ Meeting – Day 1 “We need partners. And partners need NATO.”

 

In his Doorstep Statement at the start of the NATO Foreign Ministers meetings in Brussels on 3 December, Secretary General Rasmussen indicated that discussions would be focused on the 2014 Summit agenda “to ensure the Alliance remains fit, outward looking and ready to respond to the challenges the future will bring”.

 

The Afghan elections and plans for a post-2014 NATO presence in the country would be the subject under discussion first. Mr Rasmussen welcomed the Loya Jirga's endorsement of the Bilateral Security Agreement between the United States and Afghanistan and “look[ed] forward to its timely signature” for without one “there can be no deployment and the planned assistance will be put at risk”. 

 

For the NATO-Russia Council with Foreign Minister Lavrov, Mr Rasmussen expected agreement on new areas of cooperation, including a pilot project on the destruction of old and dangerous ammunition in the Kaliningrad region of Russia. There would also be further discussions on the destruction of chemical weapons in Syria.

 

Foreign Minister Panjikidze would participate in the NATO-Georgia Commission which would discuss further cooperation after successful elections. The Secretary General closed expressing his support for Georgia’s aspirations for Euro-Atlantic integration, including the country's stated desire to become a Member State of NATO.

 

Q1. Paul Brennan, Al Jazeera: What are your worst fears if the 2014 deployment to Afghanistan does not go ahead? What priority will be given during this meeting to the situation which is ongoing in Ukraine at the moment?

 

A1.Secretary General: My concern is that if we are not able to deploy a training mission to Afghanistan it may have a negative impact on the security situation in Afghanistan and further more it may also have a negative impact on the provision of financial aid to Afghanistan. I would expect that all NATO partners, including Ukraine to live up to fundamental democratic principles including freedom of assembly and freedom of expression. Obviously we fully respect Ukrainian decisions on their alliance affiliations and to which organisations they want to belong or with which organisations they want to cooperate.

 

Q2. Dieter Ebeling, DPA: Could you elaborate on what you mean by ‘timely signature’? Is that the end of this year? Tonight you are talking about the ‘open door policy’ for possible new members. Do you think that any of these four countries you are talking about is in any way close to any membership or membership action plan or whatsoever with NATO? Isn’t there a large consensus that they are not?
 

A2. Secretary General: I would be reluctant to set an exact date for signing the security agreement but I have to remind everybody that there are certain realities that make it necessary to sign that legal framework very soon. It is much too early to go into details about our open door policy. We have still nine months to go before the Summit. I am sure the Summit will reiterate that our door remains open.

 

Q3. Justyna Pawlak, Reuters: Is that going to be a problem for NATO when France withdraws its troops next year from KFOR and Kosovo? Will you be able to find troops elsewhere to fill in the gaps?

 

A3. Secretary General: I feel confident that we will be able to fill the gaps. There is a clear political commitment to maintaining a troop presence in Kosovo sufficient to ensure a proper implementation of the political agreement between Belgrade and Pristina.

 

 

 

In his opening remarks, Secretary General Rasmussen said that next year’s Summit in the United Kingdom “will mark the start of a new chapter in the Alliance’s continuing adaptation to a rapidly evolving security landscape.  It will be, first and foremost, about [the] future NATO”. He added that this would be the first opportunity to shape the Summit agenda based on:

There would also be a focus on continuing to build NATO’s partnerships across Europe, the Middle East and North Africa. Links made during ISAF’s support for Afghanistan need to be maintained post-2014. There will also be a discussion about what more can be done for those partners who request assistance and who want to continue consulting and acting with NATO.  “So that we can stay connected – politically and militarily -- in the future.”

 

 

The Secretary General said that three themes of the 2014 Summit would be:

 

Mr Rasmussen put it simply thus; “We need partners. And partners need NATO.” 

 

Interoperability will be maintained through more training and exercises together. Alliance members will help countries build their own capacities. He reinforced NATO’s ‘out-of-area’ operations by saying: “Most of the challenges we face, now and in the future, go beyond the borders of nations or NATO.”

 

Foreign Ministers adopted a statement on the current situation in Ukraine which condemned the use of excessive force against peaceful demonstrators, called on all parties to refrain from provocations and violence and urged Ukraine to fully abide by its international commitments and to uphold the freedom of expression and assembly. ‘Ukraine remains an important partner of NATO and the Alliance highly values Ukraine’s contributions to international security.’

 

Q1. NPR: How serious are you about conveying to President Karzai that the ‘zero option’ is indeed alive and well? What is NATO's deadline if the US is giving him until the end of the year to sign the BSA? Was President Karzai invited to come to this meeting?

 

A1. Secretary General:  As this is a Foreign Ministers meeting we invited the acting Foreign Minister of Afghanistan. A ‘zero option’ is not our planning basis, but it could be the unfortunate outcome of decisions, or non-decisions, in Afghanistan. I would be reluctant to fix an exact date... what is the exact deadline? 

 

Q2. Associated Press: Could you tell us concretely, today, what the Ministers have decided in terms of trying to encourage President Karzai to sign the Bilateral Security Agreement?

 

A2. Secretary General: Afghanistan will be discussed tomorrow in the ISAF meeting, so that will be the venue for delivering messages from NATO and ISAF Ministers to the Afghan Government.

 

Q3:  You mentioned that there's going to be some changes with regard to Libya. The requests of support are taking shape there. Could you just elaborate on what that means exactly?

A3. Secretary General: We have looked closely into the Libyan Government’s request for assistance in developing a security architecture and we have now provided a platform for providing such assistance. We have established a small team that will work with the Libyan authorities, and in close coordination with other actors, international organizations, as well as individual nations, in order to ensure no duplication and complementarity in the way we assist the Libyans.

 

Q4. Mustafa Basherat, Radio Free Europe, Kabul Bureau: Don't you think that if NATO and ISAF leave Afghanistan after 2014 there will be a new threat for the international community?

 

A4. Secretary General:  Yes. If we get an invitation from Afghanistan we are prepared to deploy. But NATO is not an occupation force. We intend to help Afghanistan within a proper legal framework.

 

Q5. TV Imedi, Georgia: Will the 2014 Summit be enlargement-oriented? Can Georgia expect a Membership Action Plan or some other form of cooperation?

 

A5. Secretary General: It's much too early to say anything about how we will address the open-door policy in exact terms, at the Summit.

 

Following an appeal to the Ukrainian Government to listen to the voices of its people, Secretary Kerry urged all sides to conduct themselves peacefully. He said the NATO summit in Wales is “really going to be a pivotal time for NATO and for a transformation that is taking place with respect to NATO engagement and responsibilities. It will be a pivotal time for our alliance and for the transatlantic relationship”. He reiterated the Secretary General’s three key themes for the Summit.

 

Mr Kerry said there had been discussions about continued support for Afghanistan which would be discussed at much greater length the following day. Partnerships and exercises will result in “those most capable are willing to deploy with us when and if needed”. He explained that he had signed a US-Estonian Cyber Partnership Statement earlier in the day which committed both of us to do even more together in order to combat “this real and growing security concern within the cyber sphere”.

Q1. Michael Gordon, New York Times: The former Commander of NATO and American forces in Afghanistan, General John Allen wrote last week that it was a mistake to insist that President Karzai sign a BSA this year. And his basic argument was that the United States should not let one man stand in the way of an agreement. Why shouldn’t the United States wait till after the next election for the agreement to be signed? What is the real deadline? And the NATO Secretary General just told us that he himself is not setting an exact date.

 

A1. Secretary Kerry: I don’t think I’ve ever spoken with respect to a hard, fixed specific date for signing the security agreement. We are asking for is the optimum, which is to try to manage this transition in Afghanistan. Now, it doesn’t have to be – his minister of defense can sign it, the government can sign it, somebody can accept responsibility for this. I think that’s what we need to aim for is sooner, not later, because that is what is best for Afghanistan.

 

Q2. Ana Pisonero, Europa Press: What can NATO do to influence events on the ground in Ukraine?

 

A2. Secretary Kerry: NATO has made a statement about it today, but I don’t think NATO has a role and is not contemplating a role.

 

Q3. Elise Labott, CNN: The US gives a lot of money to Ukraine; it does have a lot of influence. So what can the U.S. do in particular? And to add to that, Russia has been taking a lot of heavy-handed tactics to stop this.

 

 

A3. Secretary Kerry: Europe and Europe’s friends all decline to engage in a rather overt, and we think, inappropriate bidding war with respect to the choice that might or might not be made by Ukraine. We, like our European friends, believe that the people of Ukraine ought to have the right to be able to express themselves freely, without violence, and that the leadership in the Ukraine ought to listen to them.