Weekly press briefing

JAMES APPATHURAI (NATO Spokesperson): Okay guys and ladies, shall we start? As I said… most importantly… I think this won’t… this won’t take too long today. Let me just give a quick update of the meeting between General Kayani and the Secretary General. As you know, General Kayani came to meet with the Military Committee, with the Chairman of the Military Committee, and also with the Secretary General. And in essence there were two main subjects: one was NATO-Pakistan relations, you would expect of course it being General Kayani that we focused – or they focused – those aspects of the discussion not on the political relationship but on the military relationship which is going fine, but could go better. Both General Kayani and the Secretary General, but also the Military Committee expressed their interest in seeing the further establishment of the border control coordination centres. These are centres that are currently at least on the Afghan side of the border, the first one being at Torkham Gate in Khyber, where you have joint Afghan-Pakistani and NATO ISAF participation. In essence, for exchange of intelligence, to stem cross-border insurgent movement. I have been to the first one, and it is a very impressive and effective tool. The second one is about to be opened, and they are working on the third, all on the Afghan side of the border for the moment, but there is an aspiration to open them also on the Pakistani side. A total of six have been agreed in principle, and as I say number two is about to open. We… They discussed enhancing liaison arrangements between NATO and Pakistan on the military side. They discussed transit of goods and supplies into Afghanistan. I can say – and this was again briefed this morning – that despite the operations that are underway in Pakistan, NATO logistical supplies are in essence unaffected. Less than 1% of the supplies that go through Pakistan are in any way affected by any kind of insurgent attacks. Finally they discussed in this… in this… on this area they discussed increased training for Pakistani officers in NATO schools. Now the Secretary General indicated that NATO would be open to a discussion about more with regard to training and General Kayani certainly took note of that in a positive spirit.

The second issue about which I can’t say very much is ongoing Pakistani operations. In particular in Swat, but also the operations that have taken place in Buner and elsewhere. General Kayani updated the military authorities as well as the Secretary General on the conduct of operations, his assessment of where they are going to go, but I am not obviously at liberty to discuss the details of that. The Secretary General listened with interest, but his only comment was to reiterate that while we have an interest in what takes place on the other side of the border with regards to support in Pakistan for insurgent activities in Afghanistan, NATO’s operations ends at the border… end at the border, and he was very clear on that point.

Today, the Secretary General and then the NAC met with the Armenian Foreign Minister, Mr. Nalbandian, and the Defence Minister, Mr. Ohanyan, that’s O-H-A-N-Y-A-N, discussed in essence four issues. One is… well three issues: NATO-Armenia relations, and in particular the IPAP as we call it – Individual Partnership Action Plan – in essence, this is guiding Armenian defence reforms, and NATO is helping to support those defence reforms. Armenia has a very independent foreign policy. We understand that, and respect it fully, but of course… NATO is happy to support Armenia in its reform efforts. They have just developed a new what we call IPAP document, so another year of reform proposals. And that we hope will give fresh momentum to our cooperation. The Secretary General also asked about regional issues, two in particular, and I think the ambassadors of course were also very interested. One is on progress in normalization of relations between Armenia and Turkey. As you know there have been talks on a roadmap to normalised relations between the two countries, including the opening at some point in the future of the… the border. The Minister updated ambassadors on the Armenian perspective on this. They also discussed – and let me stress by the way that the Secretary General welcomed, and the ambassadors welcomed, the recent steps that have been taken towards normalisation of Armenia-Turkey relations. The second issue is of course Nagorno-Karabakh. Again, there is no NATO… no direct NATO role in resolving the Nagorno-Karabakh issue. This is something being led by the OSCE’s Minsk group. And NATO supports the principles that the Minsk group follows in this case, but I do know, and we do know that the two presidents – the Armenian and Azeri presidents – have met recently in Prague and are working to try to resolve this outstanding issue along the principles that the Minsk group has set out. Finally on operations, Armenia contributes to the KFOR mission. Armenia is also looking to contribute to the ISAF mission, and that was supported of course, and welcomed by all of the ambassadors.

Then three quick… Four quick points and then we can… I’ll be happy to take your questions. The Secretary General is right now in Luxembourg. He has met with Prime Minister Juncker. He will have an audience with Grand Duke Henri, and then meet with Minister Asselborn… he’s in the plane on his way home. On Monday and Tuesday he will do two things, both in Oslo. First a bilateral visit. He will begin, I think this is because she happens to be in the country at the same time, with a quick meeting with the Executive Director of the UN World Food Programme, Ms. Sheeran, S-H-double-E-R-A-N. NATO has been escorting World Food Programme ships – cargo ships – into Somalia since the World Food Programme asked for NATO assistance. When the Secretary General was at the UN General Assembly last year, and last September, and I think they will be meeting, that will be the main area of discussion, it will be Somalia and how we can continue to support each other. He will then meet with the Minister of Foreign Affairs, and the Minister of Defence, Mr. Store, and Ms. Strom-Erichson. He’ll meet with the Prime Minister the next morning, Mr. Stoltenberg, and then begins on Tuesday the NATO Parliamentary Assembly meeting. Now I stress that the Parliamentary Assembly is not formally a NATO body, it is those groups of parliamentarians who are interested in NATO countries and in Partner countries as well in NATO issues and supporting the alliance. And they are of course very important to us, and we work as closely as we can with them, but they are – I have to stress – an autonomous body that makes their own decisions and does their own thing. The North Atlantic Council will be also travelling up to the MPA meeting. The Secretary General will deliver an address there, after meeting with senior parliamentarians, and there will be a joint session of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly and NATO… and the North Atlantic Council. For the agenda if you go to their web site you can see what their agenda is, and then on Wednesday he goes to Rome, where he will meet at one o’clock with Minister Frattini, who I’m sure will have an interesting story to tell from his visit to Iran. He will meet with the Minister of Defence Mr. La Russa, with the President, then with Prime Minister Berlusconi, and that will be the… I think? That’s the end of the… Oh, no. And then to the NATO Defence College. That’s on Thursday. And then home.

Finally, let me preview something which we will put out as a… as a media advisory, and that is the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council (EAPC) Security Forum. Now we do this once every eighteen months or so. The last one was in… it was on Lake Ohrid, I think. The last one was on Lake Ohrid, and the one before that was in Sweden. This one will take place in Kazakhstan. On 24 and 25 June. I’ve never seen that noise and those faces before, I have to say.

(LAUGHTER)

24-25 June, it will be held in the city of Astana, hosted by the Kazakh government in the Palace of Independence. And I think to address the faces and noise issue immediately, we’re trying to find, and I think we will find a substantial number of spaces on the plane that will go…

(LAUGHTER)

…that will go directly there. So there should be… 24-25 June. In essence it will focus on three issues. One will be Afghanistan. One will be Central Asia and Caucasian security issues. And the third will be energy security. And frankly while I had not I have to say in previous jobs paid too much attention to that part of the world, once you do, you see how important Kazakhstan is, how important Central Asia is for regional security, for energy security, for energy tout court, and for Afghanistan. And there is a narcotics and extremism element to what goes on there that makes actually this location – while logistically not the easiest for those of us who live here – I think intellectually very… very attractive. As I say, we are trying to, and I think we will have a number of seats on the plane to take people directly.

Q: (Inaudible)

APPATHURAI: What’s over here? What you want a private jet?

Q: (Inaudible)

APPATHURAI: No, it will be no Hercules. It will have seats. It’ll have seats, it’ll have food, and unlike one of the flights we offered to journalists a few years ago, it will have food and cutlery.

Q: Wow!

(LAUGHTER)

APPATHURAI: Knives and forks will also be I am quite sure on the plane. Because I ate with a hotel key card, like everybody else on that particular NATO flight back… from wherever we took you. There will also be an information day on what NATO is doing with what we call our Science for Peace programme, which is in essence science projects linking up the scientific communities, the academics, and students in that region to each other and also to us. So there will be a presentation on that. Finally, the NATO Parliamentary Assembly will also be there at what’s called the Rose Roth Seminar. You can find more information again on their web site. I don’t really know anything more about that, but they will be there. There will be a number of NATO parliamentarians. We don’t yet have the formal agenda, nor a formal list of speakers, because it’s a little bit down… down the tracks and we’ve just confirmed the dates and the logistics. So they’re working on that, but it is I think, as I say intellectually certainly for me an interesting location and a set of interesting topics. That’s all I’ve got.

Q: James, when you said that relations could be better with Pakistan, what are you expecting from them? Or what the chairman of the Military Committee or the Secretary General asked for more from Pakistan? And my second question is about these six centres…

APPATHURAI: Yes.

Q: What will be exactly the objectives? Is it sort of security borders? What exactly it’s doing?

APPATHURAI: Sure.

Q: And the first one in Khyber, so where will be the second, where will be the third, the fourth, and so forth? Thank you.

APPATHURAI: Thank you. When I said it can be better, I don’t think I used the word “better” but I think we can certainly… I think the idea is that we can enhance – further enhance – NATO-Pakistan relations. I might add, before I go into any more detail, that we also believe the same is true on the political side. The Secretary General has invested quite a lot in the political relationship. I am quite sure the new Secretary General, the incoming Secretary General will do the same. But with General Kayani of course we focused on military issues. And I think I mentioned quite specifically areas where I think we can do better. We can do more, let’s put it that way, we can do more. And that is liaison arrangements, that is the border coordination centres, that is on training. We have with the Pakistanis and the Afghans in Kabul, a Joint Intelligence Centre, again staffed by the three parties. We have the Tripartite Commission which meets on a regular basis, including at the highest level, the 4-star level. And we have these BCCs. These BCCs are focused on sharing information with regard to cross-border insurgent movements. So let me stress it is not about providing intelligence about what’s going on deep inside Pakistan to anybody. It is about… it is focused on cross-border insurgent movement, sharing information, and where possible that shared information can help in the coordination of operations on either side of the border. So let me stress again, it is about Pakistani operations on the Pakistani side of the border, and about NATO-Afghan operations on the Afghan side of the border, and not about anybody crossing the border. But it is about intelligence-sharing. As to the… and this happens. There is aerial feeds from various platforms. I have seen them, live aerial feeds. Very, very effective in the area that it covers. As to the locations, I am not sure I am at liberty to give the locations of the yet-to-be-built ones so I won’t. There has to be more than one question out there.

Q: This is a plot.

(LAUGHTER)

APPATHURAI: Fatigué en anglais.

Q: La même question que la semaine dernière, qui est : où en sommes nous de la prochaine réunion du conseil OTAN-Russie au niveau ministériel et au niveau des ambassadeurs?

APPATHURAI: Au niveau des ambassadeurs, si je comprends bien, le prochain (sic) réunion sera le 27 de ce mois-ci. Il n’y a pas encore de réunion prévue au niveau ministériel.

Q: (Inaudible)

APPATHURAI: Oh… Yes, I’m sorry. NRC meeting, there will be an ambassadorial level meeting on the 27th of this month, and there is no ministerial level meeting yet scheduled.

Q: James, there was some media reports that Russia is going to held (sic) some kind of (inaudible)-scale exercises in the Caucus area, like a response to the exercises NATO have in Georgia. I’m just curious if NATO received some kind of invitation from Russia to take part in?

(LAUGHTER)

Q: And the second part of the question, could you please update us of what’s going on in Georgia now? And maybe if Russian observers for example, arrived on the scene? Thank you.

APPATHURAI: Thank you. As to the first, I am not aware that Russia has invited NATO either to participate or to send observers for that matter to the Caucasian exercises that they are planning, but I have seen the same reports that you have. As to what’s going on in Georgia now, no there are no Russian observers there. The first phase, the table-top element of the Partnership for Peace exercise, has been completed, and they will soon start the field exercises, as you know this involves a few hundred, 450 I think is the number, 450 international troops from fourteen countries simulating a UN peacekeeping exercise which comes under some kind of terrorist attack and how best to work together to defend against this kind of terrorist attack. There is a media day planned on the 31st of May, near the end of the meeting, near the end of the operation, or the exercise, excuse me, near the end of the exercise, and then the exercise will come to an end a couple of days later. But it’s going fine, and I think is attracting the attention that it merits, which is not much, because it is what we had said it was.

Q: Okay, James. (Inaudible) Forgive me my ignorance, but could you please remind us how many countries are participating in EAPC programme right now, and on which level shall they participate in the Security Forum in Kazakhstan? And one more follow-up, can you tell us anything about the programme of the future NRC council? Thank you.

APPATHURAI: Programme of the NRC Council… I think there’s fifty countries in the EAPC. Fifty. Five-zero. I think that’s right, but if not I’ll get an SMS in five seconds. And as… what level they will participate at the EAPC Security Forum I don’t yet know. I know there’s at least one Minister who has already accepted. So there will be some ministerial level participation. But as to how many, we’re… it’s still too early to tell. I think as to the NRC, if I understand correctly you just wanted to know what the future schedule is of meetings? Was that the question?

Q: What do you plan to discuss during the… coming meeting?

APPATHURAI: Ah! It is still to be determined what will be discussed, but I know one issue will be discussed, and that will be in essence how to improve the working practices of the NATO-Russia Council to make it more effective. What issues should be brought to the table? How often should they meet? How should they prepare the meetings? Who should participate in the meetings? In other words, should there be more expert-level participation along with the ambassadors? These are the kinds of things that are being discussed, and they’re not just being discussed in the abstract, I can tell you. Many NATO countries as well as Russia have put forward concrete ideas in writing that are being circulated and discussed amongst the ambassadors now. So there is a shared will to make the NRC a more effective tool for all the 29 members, not just the 28 NATO countries, for the 29… countries they want to see it become more practical and more effective. There may be other issues, Georgia, I don’t know what, but for the moment that I do know is on the agenda.

Q: Je peux poser ma question en français?

APPATHURAI: S’il te plaît.

Q: Oui. Le secrétaire général était à Athènes et il a fait une déclaration assez… il a été assez franchement, disons qu’il n’était pas optimiste sur la résolution du nom après avoir rencontré le premier ministre et le président macédonien?

APPATHURAI: Oui.

Q: Est-ce que tu peux donner plus de détails là-dessus? Pourquoi est-ce qu’il n’est pas optimiste? Est-ce que ça veut dire aussi que vous êtes pas optimiste pour une invitation… dans les mois à venir? Les négociations doivent reprendre d’ici… d’ici juin.

APPATHURAI: Okay. Je dois dire… Merci. Yes, my colleagues are all confirming that the fifty is indeed the right number. Le secrétaire général – je réponds en anglais ou en français? Ça m’est égale. The Secretary General said when he was in Greece that after his visit to Skopje he was not as optimistic as he would like to be about a resolution, a quick resolution to the name issue. What did he mean? I think he meant, if we can speak very bluntly, that he would have hoped to have seen a greater spirit of or inclination to… towards compromise with regard to the name than he found. The name issue sorry, than he found. That’s… what does that translate to in terms of timing for an invitation? We all know the situation, and that is when the name issue is resolved, we will I think very quickly move to an invitation to bring the accession process. But he was very clear and very blunt that he… he doesn’t… he is not more optimistic now after his trip to Skopje than he was before he arrived.

Q: Yes, James. Two months after the NATO summit, where do you stand with the New Strategic Concept?

APPATHURAI: With regards to the New Strategic Concept, there will be this summer a seminar launching the process to… to update or revise the Strategic Concept. There will be participation by the media in this. It will be as transparent a process as we can make it, that will be launched under this Secretary General. I will give you the exact dates and location when it is confirmed, but they are working very hard to ensure that that happens in the next couple of months. Then the new Secretary General will take the reins on the 1st of August. I am quite sure that one of the reins he intends to grasp very firmly is the one that’s steering the strategic concept process. So he… I expect that he will announce quickly upon taking office what… how he intends to direct this process. And you know that the end result is to be by the Lisbon Summit. Lisbon… by the summit in Portugal, we don’t have an exact date, but eighteen months to two years from now there will be a panel of distinguished, eminent persons who will begin crafting the process, and at a certain stage it will move to the… to intergovernmental negotiation, but the exact timings of that are not yet clear. Beyond that, it is for the new Secretary General to set out what his intentions are, and I know he’s working on that. This will be something to which he pays extremely close attention. Go ahead, and then we’ll come over here.

Q: Yes. NATO military planners are soon to propose a CONOPS for the anti-piracy, sort of long-term anti-piracy to the NAC next month as you know. My question concerns really why the SECGEN is meeting with the World Food, the head of the World Food Programme, there’s not much to discuss really, except just “Hi, how do you do?” Unless the military planners and the political authorities are looking at a change in tactics: how the NATO ships might protect the World Food, so why are they meeting with her?

APPATHURAI: Well he… I think he’s meeting with her simply because they met a year ago. We’ve started this. I wouldn’t read more into this meeting than a mis-à-jour. It’s a… you know we’re both in the airport. We started this thing, how’s it going? The… you’re quite right that there’s a very complicated discussion being had on piracy, and if you look at the results of the meeting that just took place in Malaysia on piracy. I think… when I saw the final statement I think it’s an excellent synopsis of very complicated issues that everybody faces with regard to this. And NATO is not immune to these complications by any standards. But you’re quite right. Discussions are ongoing right now on preparing a long-term mission. And that will happen, I think, as we look to the end of the deployment of SNMG at the end of June, long before that, the military will be coming forward with options for a long-term mission. Yeah, sure…

Q: (Inaudible) concept on common ROE, on detention?

APPATHURAI: Uh ROE?

Q: On detention.

APPATHURAI: Yes, exactly, sorry. The ROE question is already settled. There are more robust rules of engagement, the Allies have agreed to that but…?

Q: Detention.

APPATHURAI: Yes, the legal aspects. They are under discussion. I could not tell you when they will be resolved. I don’t… I just don’t have an answer. They are more complicated than I had thought.

Q: Hi, James. Just to know what will be the main message of the Secretary General during his trip in Rome, relating to Afghanistan? Thank you.

APPATHURAI: On… Well I have not seen the checklist, but let me just guess a little bit. First thing I think he will want to do is to thank Prime Minister Berlusconi for his personal investment in upgrading NATO strategic communications capabilities. The last time they met they discussed extensively the challenge of effectively communicating what we are doing in Afghanistan. And Prime Minister Berlusconi took the initiative to provide to NATO direct support in terms of personnel, in terms of equipment to help us communicate better. So he will want to thank Prime Minister Berlusconi for that. Because it is a substantial and very welcome and very necessary investment following up on what Denmark has done for us with NATO TV, which has become something very useful. So I think he’ll want to thank him for that. Second of course he wants… he’ll want to recognize, and they will want to discuss security in the country, and that has two elements for of course the Italian forces in Herat, or in the West. What is the security situation there? The regional context, including with Iran, is very relevant if you’re Italian. And they will want to look forward to the elections where all regions of the country will see Afghan security operations with NATO in third-line support to ensure that the Afghans have as free and fair an election as possible. So regional context, the security environment, strategic communications with regard to Afghanistan, I think that that will be the main set of topics. I think they will, as they always do, discuss NATO-Russia relations. Prime Minister Berlusconi plays a very important role within NATO, and Italy plays a very important and active role within NATO with regard to NATO-Russia relations. So I am absolutely sure that will be on the agenda. They may wish to look forward to… or look at the region closer to home, and that is of course the Balkans and the security situation in Kosovo, which always comes up, which seems to be for the moment relatively stable, despite recent clashes. And I am 100% convinced that the strategic concept will be a main topic. Prime Minister Berlusconi and the Italian government will want to play its full part in shaping this process. And I’m sure they’ll discuss that as well.

Q: James, two questions. One, the Secretary General was participating in the meeting with EU Foreign and Defence Ministers. We haven’t heard anything for a long time on EU-NATO relations, and whether the old technical problems in the operations are resolved in sharing informations (sic) and this Turkish separate issue affecting the NATO and EU operations. And on Kosovo, military authorities are preparing their assessment of the situation and we are hearing completely different positions from NATO member states. Some are saying that by June there could be a decision to change the structure of KFOR. Others are saying Americans on the record that nothing will happen before autumn, so where do we stand on this, and when is exactly the Defence Minister meeting?

APPATHURAI: Thank you. The bottom line on NATO-EU relations is no, the political blockages between the two organizations have not been removed, and they are very frustrating and limiting in terms of NATO-EU cooperation. There is not much that has proven to be effective until now in removing those because of course it is not only a NATO problem, it is a NATO-EU problem, and very frankly of course it is a problem that is linked to other issues outside of the two organizations. And as a result, this Secretary General certainly has been frustrated by this particular aspect of our agenda. That being said, we have at the tactical and operational level managed to work effectively side by side. Where necessary there has been informal but effective coordination on the ground – in Kosovo, at sea with regard to piracy, in Afghanistan during the last elections… where we were able to provide in extremis guarantees of emergency support to the EU observers, and where individual countries made individual arrangements with the European Union. All this to say we manage to make it work, but it could work better if the political blockages were removed. Yes, you are right, there is of course a discussion and assessment going on within the military to see or to provide a military assessment of the… the possibility of making any changes to the… or the appropriateness, let’s put it that way, of making any changes to NATO’s… KFOR’s size or structure, and that this should be discussed at the June Ministerial. But of course this is not just a question of military assessment, it is a question of political decision as well, based on military assessment but taking into… taking also into account political considerations, which is why it is impossible to predict what will come out of a) the June Ministerial if anything in terms of decisions, or any subsequent or prior… any NAC meeting. So yes, there will be a military assessment. It should be ready for the June Ministerial, but I could not predict, and I don’t think anybody could predict what decisions may or may not come out of the June Ministerial. A follow-up? Sure.

Q: All countries are saying that unilateral decisions are not helpful…

APPATHURAI: Yeah.

Q: …but some countries have already made some unilateral decisions either to withdraw completely from KFOR operations or to downsize their participation. So what… If there is no NATO decision, are member states going to act alone after so many years of being in together, out together?

APPATHURAI: Yeah. The NATO position is very, very clear. The NATO Headquarters position is very, very clear. We do not want to see a scenario where countries make unilateral decisions with regard to their forces in Kosovo. Indeed in together, out together has been the principle. We respect the fact of course that any country can make any decision it wishes to make. This is an intergovernmental body; any national decisions are by definition legitimate decisions, but what makes the most sense politically and militarily is for us to do things together through a process. That process is clear, and well-structured, and that is military advice followed by a consensus political decision. And that is the process we hope and certainly will press to continue to be the way forward.

Q: I just wanted to ask a few more details about that Kazakhstan meeting? Who’s going to be attending exactly, and also can you remind us of the dates of the Ministerial?

APPATHURAI: The NATO Ministerial?

Q: The June Ministerial.

APPATHURAI: It’s 8th and 9th, is that right? I think it’s 8th and 9th. I’ll just check that too. But...

(INAUDIBLE)

…oh, ten and eleven. 11th, 12th? Good. It’s… Thursday-Friday, it’s Thursday-Friday. See? He knows. Indeed. It’s the 11th and 12th. There you go. 11th and 12th. I don’t know yet who will be attending. We don’t know yet. There is no attendance list, nor list of participants yet, except as I mentioned one Minister, but that’s… that’s still to be announced formally. So I will let you know when we know, but we don’t know yet. There will be… Let me though just say this. There will be politicians there, there will be ambassadors there. There will be participants we hope from as many of the fifty countries as possible. There will be journalists participating, there will be representatives of non-governmental organizations specializing in, for example, energy issue or regional security issues. Academics will be participating, and there will be sets of panels where this mix of civil society and government, including energy experts from corporations, I hope and expect, can come out and speak. So intellectually it should be interesting. It will not just be another group of bureaucrats talking to each other. Or politicians, which is much more interesting.

Q: Je voudrai revenir sur la Somalie.

APPATHURAI: Oui.

Q: Tu as parlé des «rules of engagement» et des «legal questions». Je ne comprends pas très bien. 21 des pays de l’OTAN sont membres de l’Union européenne, et ils ont réglé les «legal questions». À tel point que les pays de l’OTAN qui ne sont pas membre de l’Union européenne, comme la Norvège, ou des pays comme l’Allemagne qui participent à des groupes navales de l’OTAN préfèrent mettre leurs bateaux sous commandement de l’Union européenne plutôt que sous commandement de l’OTAN. Est-ce que dans le futur, puisque tu parles d’une extension du rôle de l’OTAN, s’envisage une si bonne coopération entre l’UE et l’OTAN que dans les opérations où les gens de l’Union européenne sont des gendarmes, des policiers, des juristes, mais toutes les questions militaires sont uniquement OTAN? Parce que là il y a quand même deux structures militaires parallèles? Donc, est-ce que ceci à ton avis est à l’origine de la complication dont tu parles? Est-ce qu’on envisage, do we foresee for my colleagues, do we foresee any problem in cooperation between NATO and EU once NATO has engaged in a longer-term activities off the coast of Somalia? Voilà.

APPATHURAI: Je réponds en français. Non. Je ne prévois… déjà le contexte… il n’y a aucun problème entre l’Union européenne et l’OTAN en ce qui concerne la piraterie. La coopération… je dirai sur le terrain, mais tu comprends… opérationnelle… est nécessaire à effectuer et marche très bien. Alors il n’y a aucun problème entre nos organisations. Je ne prévois franchement aucun problème au cas où il y aurait une opération à longue-terme. Et je m’attends à ce que il y ait une opération à longue-terme. Les différences entre l’Union européenne et l’OTAN… c’est vrai que l’Union européenne a un arrangement avec le Kenya. Et c’est ça la différence essentielle entre les deux organisations en ce qui concerne la détention. L’OTAN n’a pas un accord avec le Kenya, la Kenya, mais nous avons un mandat d’entrer en discussion avec des pays de la région pour voir si des accords… un arrangement similaire pourrait intéresser un de ces pays. Mais évidemment c’est très compliqué, y compris pour la Kenya, le Kenya, qui a aussi des questions de capacités. Tout ça pour dire nous regardons au sein de… au sein de l’OTAN toutes ces questions. Des accords légals (sic) entre les alliés pour avoir un système plus standardisé, et aussi des accords pour transférer quelque part, soit un pays de la région ou peut-être un tribunal international, les pirates qui sont pris en captivité. Mais pour le moment c’est une discussion qui a lieu. Ce n’est pas un problème entre les deux organisations, et ça n’a rien à faire avec le fait que l’Union européenne et la… en tant qu’opération militaire… nous nous félicitons de la présence… du présence de l’Union européenne à côté de nous.

To answer very briefly in English, no we have no problems between the two organizations because they are two military operations side by side. We are, or NATO has a mandate from the nations to enter into discussions with the regional countries to see if there is the possibility of similar arrangements, arrangements similar to what the EU has with Kenya. Kenya has some capacity problems, as you can imagine. But there is also the possibility of an international tribunal that could be established to deal with pirates that are captured, so these are some of the discussions that are underway now within the alliance. We’ll go there and then here.

Q: Yes, James, if I can go back to the Rome trip?

APPATHURAI: Yes.

Q: So when you say that the Prime Minister Berlusconi personally invested into upgrading the NATO communications system…

APPATHURAI: Yeah.

Q: Do you mean that NATO received people and equipment from Mr. Berlusconi’s family media empire?

APPATHURAI: (Laughter) No. I mean that the Italian government, like the Danish government decided to provide human and equipment support to NATO’s public diplomacy effort. This is a government decision using government assets. I have to say the equipment donation has not yet been made because we are having discussions between our technical staffs to see what exactly NATO might use. But I’ll give you an example which is NATO TV, the Danish government has provided servers, an expert, contract journalists, to help us get this up and running, and we are now migrating that system into NATO at our own costs. So the Italian government’s offer, which we are now discussing to figure out the technicalities, relates to basically in (inaudible) supporting our (inaudible) engagement.

Q: Do you have any… I guess maybe you can sort of follow it up, sort of give us what kind of…

APPATHURAI: I don’t…

Q: …how much you know, how much they promised you know in terms of people or money, and if you can just say when this was discussed? You mentioned the previous meeting that had, and if you can remind me of the dates of the visit, because I missed that.

APPATHURAI: Well I can tell you the dates of this visit, which are the 27th and 28th of this month. When the last visit was, I will have to look it up, because I am terrible with dates. It is not a question of money, it’s a question of equipment and people, it is one person. One person in essence to work on media issues. And it is equipment in essence to provide… Well let’s see what they are. So our technical experts are in discussion with them on what equipment precisely is required. Would that be cameras? Would that be equipment in NATO headquarters for dealing with imagery, storing it, broadcasting it? I don’t know yet. But that’s the… the technical people to do. And I don’t know when that will be resolved. But what I can say is Prime Minister Berlusconi himself has been focused on this issue.

Q: James, I know that NATO is not involved at all in this question that I’m going to ask, but have you any comments on what happened in Sri Lanka with the defeat of LTTA? Is there any concern of the (inaudible) situation there?

APPATHURAI: And you’ll know my answer. It is not a NATO issue. There is no comment from NATO.

Q: James, recently former German Chancellor Schröder mentioned that it’s time… came to a stop talking about the possible membership in NATO of Ukraine and Georgia. Have you had such a call, and if yes, what was the reaction?

APPATHURAI: There is no NATO government that has taken that position. There has been no formal or informal discussion within NATO of moving away from the Bucharest decision that one day these countries will, can become members when they meet the standards. So the NATO position remains totally unchanged, and I might add reaffirmed at the last summit by Chancellor Merkel. So I think the German position is very clear.

My friends, I thank you.