Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council
The 50-nation Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council (EAPC) is a multilateral forum for dialogue and consultation on political and security-related issues among Allies and partner countries. It provides the overall political framework for NATO’s cooperation with partner countries in the Euro-Atlantic area under the Partnership for Peace (PfP) programme.
EAPC members regularly exchange views on current political and security-related issues, including the evolving security situation in Kosovo, where peacekeepers from Allied and partner countries are deployed together. Longer-term consultation and cooperation also takes place in a wide range of areas.
Established in 1997, the EAPC succeeded the North Atlantic Cooperation Council (NACC), which was set up in 1991 just after the end of the Cold War. This decision reflected NATO’s desire to build a security forum better suited for a more enhanced and operational partnership, matching the increasingly sophisticated relationships being developed with partner countries.
Participation
The EAPC brings together the 32 Allies and 18 partner countries.*
* NATO’s partnerships with Russia and Belarus are currently suspended following North Atlantic Council decisions related to the security environment.
The work of the EAPC
Longer-term consultation and cooperation takes place within the framework of the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Work Programme (EAPWP), a catalogue of around 1,400 activities covering over 30 areas of cooperation. These areas include:
- crisis-management and peace-support operations;
- regional issues;
- arms control and issues related to the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and small arms and light weapons;
- combatting terrorism;
- border security;
- defence issues such as planning, budgeting, policy and strategy;
- civil preparedness and civil emergency response;
- armaments cooperation;
- nuclear safety;
- civil-military coordination of air traffic management;
- language training;
- foreign and security policy;
- military geography;
- supporting United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 and related resolutions on Women, Peace and Security;
- combatting trafficking in human beings; and
- scientific cooperation.