Final Communiqué
Chairman: Manfred Wörner
- English
- French
<p>NATO's adaptation commensurate with changes in Europe - Review of political and military strategy - Political, economic, social and ecological elements of security - Key institutions - Germany - End of the division of Europe - Closer cooperation with
- A transformed Atlantic Alliance constitutes an essential element in the new architecture of an undivided Europe; we are agreed that the Alliance must have the flexibility to continue to develop and evolve as the security situation dictates. An important basis for this transformation is the agreement of all Allies to enhance the role and responsibility of the European members. We welcome efforts further to strengthen the security dimension in the process of European integration and recognise the significance of the progress made by the countries of the European Community towards the goal of political union, including the development of a common foreign and security policy. These two positive processes are mutually reinforcing. The development of a European security identity and defence role, reflected in the strengthening of the European pillar within the Alliance, will reinforce the integrity and effectiveness of the Atlantic Alliance.
- We are agreed, in parallel with the emergence and development of a European security identity and defence role, to enhance the essential transatlantic link that the Alliance guarantees and fully to maintain the strategic unity and indivisibility of security of all our members. We will continue, in particular, to ensure the Alliance's capability to fulfil its essential functions. The Alliance is the essential forum for consultation among its members and the venue for agreement on policies bearing on the security and defence commitments of Allies under the Washington Treaty, as expressed in the Statement on NATO's Core Security Functions accompanying this Communiqué. We all agree that the military dispositions necessary to ensure the collective defence of the Allies must be maintained. This applies in particular to the integrated military structure for the Allied countries that participate in it.
- Recognising that it is for the European Allies concerned to decide what arrangements are needed for the expression of a common European foreign and security policy and defence role, we further agree that, as the two processes advance, we will develop practical arrangements to ensure the necessary transparency and complementarity between the European security and defence identity as it emerges in the Twelve and the WEU, and the Alliance. There will be a need, in particular, to establish appropriate links and consultation procedures between them in order to ensure that the Allies that are not currently participating in the development of a European identity in foreign and security policy and defence should be adequately involved in decisions that may affect their security.
- Allies are convinced that arms control and confidence-building measures will continue to shape and consolidate a new cooperative order in Europe in which no country need harbour fears for its security. The CFE Treaty is the keystone for such a stable and lasting peace on the continent. In our separate Statement yesterday, we expressed our hope that a binding agreement can soon be reached to resolve the problems which had arisen with respect to the Treaty, allowing it to move forward to early ratification and entry into force and full implementation. Once concluded, such an agreement will open the way for us to make new proposals on military manpower in Europe without delay in the CFE lA negotiations now taking place in Vienna. In the CSBM negotiations, we will seek further to strengthen openness and stability. Work within the Alliance is moving forward in preparation for new negotiations on conventional arms in Europe, open to all CSCE members, after the Helsinki CSCE Follow-Up Meeting in 1992. We look forward to informal preparatory consultations on this subject with CSCE partners in the Autumn.
- The Allies attach high importance to the earliest possible establishment of an Open Skies regime as an essential contribution to transparency among all participants. We have recently made fresh proposals to that end, and we call on all participants to join us in a prompt resumption of productive negotiations.
- In the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks (START), Allies support the United States' efforts to reach a final agreement that will provide a framework for strategic stability into the next century. Preparations among the Allies concerned are advancing on an arms control framework for US-Soviet negotiations on the reduction of their short-range nuclear forces.
- Allies have worked for many years to advance progress in the fields of non-proliferation and disarmament on a regional and global basis. The Gulf crisis demonstrated what we have long recognised: the proliferation of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and of missiles capable of delivering them, and excessive transfers of conventional arms undermine international security and increase the risk of armed conflict throughout the world. To meet this challenge, we have renewed our commitment to the earliest possible achievement of advances in the international forums dealing with specific proliferation issues. We fully endorse the goal of concluding a global, comprehensive and effectively verifiable chemical weapons convention by mid-1992 and support President Bush's initiative of 13th May to that effect. We will also seek in September 1991, at the Third Review Conference on the Biological Weapons Convention, to strengthen that Convention and to encourage further accessions to it. We will urgently pursue efforts in the United Nations and elsewhere to address the problem of excessive build-ups of conventional arms by ensuring transparency and restraint. Several of our leaders have recently proposed arms control and non-proliferation initiatives, including for the Middle East. These initiatives reflect our commitment to the goals described above.
- The Gulf conflict confirmed the importance of intra-Alliance consultations and information-sharing, which helped to reinforce political solidarity among Allies throughout the crisis. The collective expression of support for the Ally facing a direct threat demonstrated our resolve to stand by our commitments under Article 4 of the Washington Treaty and helped to deter a further expansion of hostilities. Although NATO itself was not involved in the Gulf War, the long practice of cooperation, common procedures, collective defence arrangements and infrastructure developed by NATO provided valuable assistance to those Allies that chose to make use of them in their respective efforts in support of the UN Security Council resolutions on the Gulf.
- Looking to the future, we believe that just and lasting solutions to the problems of the Gulf and the Middle East are urgently needed. We thus support current efforts for comprehensive negotiated settlements to the problems of that region.
- The Gulf crisis underlined that, in an interdependent world that increasingly affected by technological advances, we must be prepared to address other unpredictable developments that are beyond the focus of traditional Alliance concerns, but that can have direct implications for our security. Now more than ever, worldwide developments which affect our security interests are legitimate matters for consultation and, where appropriate, coordination among us. We will thus increasingly need to address broader issues and new global challenges. We will seek to do so in our consultations and in the appropriate multilateral forums, in the widest possible cooperation with other states.
- We express our deep appreciation for the gracious hospitality extended us by Her Majesty the Queen and the Government of Denmark.
At their Summit in London last July, our Heads of State and Government committed our Alliance of free and democratic nations to a process of adaptation commensurate with the changes that have reshaped the face of Europe. The fundamental review that they mandated of the Alliance's political and military strategy is being carried out on all levels and is approaching completion. Our Heads of State and Government will convene in Rome on 7th and 8th November to bring this process to its conclusion.
The process initiated by the London Declaration is an important contribution to enhancing stability and security within a free Europe. Our efforts to ensure stability in peace and freedom will recognise the political, economic, social and ecological elements of security, along with the indispensable defence dimension. The Alliance, the EC, the WEU, the CSCE and the Council of Europe are key institutions in this endeavour. We are guided by our ultimate goal of establishing a just and lasting peaceful order in the whole of Europe.
To this end, much has been achieved recently. Following the entry into force of the Treaty on the Final Settlement with Respect to Germany, united Germany for the first time participates in a meeting of the North Atlantic Council at Ministerial level as a fully sovereign member of this Alliance. As we noted in our Statement issued yesterday, the division of Europe has been overcome. In fulfilment of the undertakings contained in the Charter of Paris and the Joint Declaration of 22 States signed last November, which now assume ever greater relevance, we are cooperating with the Soviet Union and the other Central and Eastern European states more closely than before. We will work to make the forthcoming meeting of CSCE Foreign Ministers in Berlin a decisive new step in the development of the CSCE process.