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Update: 21-Nov-2000 NATO Newspages

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Ukrainian Students Visit NATO

A group of Ukrainian students and teachers made an exceptional visit to NATO on 6-7 November, where they met Lord Robertson and participated in a crisis simulation seminar. The students from the special English language School # 155 were personally invited by Lord Robertson during his visit to Ukraine in March 2000.

At NATO headquarters the students had an opportunity to test their diplomatic and crisis-response skills. Assuming the roles of NATO ambassadors, they faced a hypothetical, international crisis and were asked to achieve consensus on how to approach the situation.

In the simulated scenario, members of an ethnic minority were being killed or driven out of their homes. The students therefore faced the same difficult choices that NATO leaders have had to make. This included deciding whether imposing economic sanctions would help ease the crisis and at what stage diplomatic means of negotiating a settlement had been exhausted.

The students met with Lord Robertson in his Private Office - an honour usually reserved for international dignitaries - and were able to talk to the Secretary General and ask him questions.

During the second day of their visit, the Kyiv students visited NATO´s strategic command in Mons where they learned about NATO's military side. On their way back to Brussels, the young Ukrainians saw the battlefield of Waterloo as well as battlefields and military graveyards of the First World War.

According to school 155's principal, who accompanied the group: "The level of understanding between NATO and Ukraine is attested to by the fact that Ukrainians entrust their younger generation to NATO."

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