Florence, Italy 25 May 2000

Remarks by Toomas Hendrik Ilves, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Estonia at the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council Mr. Chairman, Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen, Let me begin by welcoming another new EAPC and PfP partner country around this table - Croatia. Croatia's participation in EAPC is a most welcome and overdue addition. This enlargement of EAPC membership and PfP cooperation serves as practical evidence of the right direction of our joint work for the Euro-Atlantic security. For us, the EAPC is and will remain an important forum for political and practical cooperation and therefore Estonia supports suggestions made over the last six months toward raising the efficacy of the EAPC. We especially support proposals to increase transparency and improve the exchange of information. We also hope that NATO continues to look for ways to keep Partners better informed of ongoing discussions within the NAC. The remainder of my intervention concerns the Estonian Governments decision to considerably upgrade our participation security co-operation, measured in the most concrete of terms: commitment of manpower and finances. First, regarding Crisis Management and peacekeeping. Despite our small population, Estonia has contributed to IFOR, SFOR and KFOR. Currently we plan to double our manpower contribution to KFOR. This is material proof we share the conviction of many around this table that peacekeeping truly is the key to keeping the peace in today's Europe and that participation in NATO-led peacekeeping operations the Political Military Framework continues to play a useful role. As further evidence of how seriously we take these matters, just last week in New York Estonia announced that we would increase fivefold our contribution and commit to pay 100% of our assigned share of UN peacekeeping assessments. Up to now, we have been covering 20% of assessments, as is generally asked of states in our particular category. Estonia, however, regards peacekeeping as such an important item that we have now volunteered to forego the discount in payments that we have heretofore enjoyed. One cannot produce or consume security at sale prices and hope to be taken seriously, either as an applicant to NATO or as a candidate to the EU. Secondly I would touch upon conflict prevention and to Georgia. Over the last half-year, questions related to Georgia have come up repeatedly in the EAPC. My country has been keenly interested in this issue. As of last January, the Estonian border guard authority is taking part in the OSCE mission in Georgia, and we have reacted quickly to calls for expanding and strengthening the mission by proposing our own appropriate candidates for the job. In addition, we are responding to the Georgian Government's appeal for training of its border guards. Using the reform task force we recently established, Estonia stands ready to share our own experience in establishing a border guard authority. We are willing to consider all manner of aid also by establishing a "Know-how" fund to share Estonia's positive experiences. My last point concerns another important topic which supports directly and is inextricably intertwined with EAPC cooperation - the MAP whose first cycle is now coming to an end. Participation provided experience in planning and implementation, among other things. Our follow-up meetings with NATO representatives, in addition to the initial summaries, suggest that this first ANP cycle has been successful not just for Estonia, but for NATO as a whole, as stressed the Final Communique yesterday. For all candidates, including Estonia, the MAP has not only generated useful guidance and practical work, but, even more importantly, has revealed a political cohesion and cooperation on enlargement. This has been demonstrated during our 19+1 NAC meetings and more obviously, among the candidate countries by issuing a joint statement in Vilnius less than a week ago. This is our forward looking approach to Euro-Atlantic security. Thank you for your attention.