Madrid, Spain 4 June 2003

Address by H.E. Dr. Antanas VALIONIS, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Lithuania at the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council Meeting First Panel: New threats to security and the role of partnership in dealing with them NATO has developed a number of partnerships originally for the purpose of strengthening trust, mutual familiarity, as well as friendly and cooperative tics with the Partners in the Euro-Atlantic area. By now, the scope of the Partnership's objectives has expanded immensely. The Partners have benefited from the self-differentiation principle in order to pursue their individual objectives in relations with the Alliance ranging from simple familiarization to full-fledged membership. But the Partnership has also grown into a tool in the hands of the Euro-Atlantic community in addressing such "new threats" and challenges as terrorism, policy of genocide, low-intensity conflicts, post-conflict crisis management, WMD proliferation, organized crime, illicit drug trafficking and others. The Partnership has become part of the international community's response to them. And so has enlargement, as one of the most advanced forms of partnership, ultimately turning partnership into genuine integration. However important the military response to terrorism, proliferation and other new threats may be, it is not the only and often not even the main one. Of paramount importance are intelligence sharing, international and internal legal instruments and their application, the barring of the financing of terrorist and other illicit activities, and the investigation and elimination of social, causes thereof. A response to these threats can only be effective if it is a truly multi-national, multi-dimensional and multi-institutional endeavour. Of such response NATO's Partnership has yet to become a part. That is why in the national Program Against Terrorism (adopted in January last year) the Lithuanian Parliament identified a wide spectrum of measures to prevent Lithuania from becoming a target or a transit corridor or a base for activities of terrorists of any kind. The Programme, now under implementation, envisages physical protection, international co-operation, intelligence, policing, economic, financial, educational and other measures. International security partnership enables direct collective response (including military) to the new threats, and the development of capabilities necessary to give such response. Additional synergy is gained through cooperation and coordination. Partnership enables exchange of intelligence helping partners involved in their internal national efforts and in setting up collective actions. It also allows exchange of experience of internal work in suppression and prevention of the acts of terrorism and in persecution of the terrorists Many of the EAPC Partners, such as the countries of the South Caucasus or Central Asia, and some Allies (especially, on the Southern flank) are located in the borderland next to the regions where important new threats emanate from. Many of us are lucky enough not to have the same extent of problems with terrorism, organized crime, illicit drug trafficking of the sort they have. Hence, our moral, political and operational imperative to co-operate and assist them. The need for effective partnership against the "new threats" is even broader than tine limits of EAPC permit. Bilateral, multilateral or coalition-based outreach to key partners outside the EAPC has lately been playing an extremely important part. We also need - and perhaps we have already partly in place - overarching partnerships between different NATO-based fora and institutions, including EAPC/PfP, Mediterranean Dialogue, NATO-Russia Council, NATO-Ukraine Commission and others. To these be also added NATO's partnerships with the UN, OSCE and, probably most importantly, with the European Union. Most of these partnerships still need building up or improving and have some unused potential for being fully employed in the fight of the international community against the new threats.