Sofia, Bulgaria 28 Apr. 2006

Joint news conference by the NATO Secretary General and the Ukrainain Foreign Minister Meeting of the NATO-Ukraine Commission Foreign Ministers’ level Sofia, Bulgaria, 28 April 2006 JAMES APPATHURAI (NATO Spokesperson): Ladies and Gentlemen, the Secretary General and the Foreign Minister will each make brief opening statements. We'll have time for some questions for the Secretary General. JAAP DE HOOP SCHEFFER (NATO Secretary General): Good morning. Let me start by that we just finished, I could say as usual, a very productive meeting with our friend and colleague Minister Tarasyuk, Borys Tarasyuk. I say a good spirited meeting where we got an interesting and comprehensive briefing by the Ukrainian Foreign Minister of course on the recent political developments in Ukraine. Allies, once again as they did before and I did before, expressed congratulations for the conduct of the parliamentary elections in Ukraine, free and fair elections, and I think that that was a real milestone. We should not underestimate that. Allies of course expressed the view that they are looking now very much forward to working with the new government when it is formed. And as I said, of course Minister Tarasyuk informed us about the state of play and the state of progress there as well. Of course Ministers discussed the current and the future prospects of NATO-Ukraine relations. I think the general feeling was and is and there were compliments over the conduct of our Intensified Dialogue on Ukraine's membership and relevant reforms. You know it's now a year ago, I think slightly over a year ago, that we decided to that Intensified Dialogue in Vilnius. All speakers welcomed the NATO-Ukraine annual target plan President Yushchenko approved earlier this month. I think that is an excellent road map for the integration efforts and more broadly for the modernization reforms. It was also clear that Allies expressed their strong desire and their wish to continue the assistance by the Allies for the reforms in Ukraine and on important projects we have - may I mention the destruction of small arms and light weapons and so-called MANPADS. What is crucial, what I reiterated and what the Allies reiterated, is security sector reform and we are looking very much forward to high level consultations NATO and Ukraine will have on security sector reform on different levels in the near future. Let me add that there was also a lot appreciation and praise for Ukrainian contribution to NATO operations, including the support for Operation Active Endeavour in the Mediterranean, which is now beginning, the prospect of participation in ISAF and logistical support for the Darfur mission. That is a demonstration and I think I should underline that, that Ukraine is increasingly pulling its weight being a security provider and actively participating in NATO's operations and missions. It is clear, let me say that finally, that Allies are well aware of Ukraine's aspirations. And you know, I can only reiterate that NATO's door is open to European democracies that meet Alliance standards and I think what we have seen today again is the appreciation of the progress Ukraine has made. It was also said, and you know this, that this is a performance based process. You can't link weeks or months or dates to the continuation of the process and we all know what Ukraine's ambitions are. Those ambitions are the Membership Action Plan. This was an informal meeting as I should reiterate, so we made no decisions today, but it is clear that we will continue our close co-operation discussions on concrete reforms, practical steps and the implementation of our co-operation. Let me on that note, and I think it's a positive note we saw here again this morning, a note of solidarity, a note of support, a note of great interest in the political process in Ukraine and the new government and the political program of the new government. The Minister will speak for himself, but NATO of course hopes and expects that it will see a continuation of the foreign policy line, the basic foreign policy line, of Ukraine, of Euro-Atlantic integration. But I'm outside my mandate now, within the mandate of Borys Tarasyuk, so I think it's high time that he takes the floor. Borys please. BORYS TARASYUK (Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ukraine): Thank you Jaap . Dear friends, this meeting of Foreign Ministers of NATO and Ukraine was informal in form and so was the discussion. The discussion was very informal and at the same time very friendly; very positive atmosphere. I would like to say that we really enjoyed the very friendly atmosphere of this meeting and a positive assessment of Allies of Ukraine's election, parliamentary and local elections. We took with appreciation the hopes of Allies for the quick as possible formation of a new government in Ukraine and the continuity of foreign policy objectives of Ukraine. I would like to say that I delivered to Allies our vision of our current stage of the relationship and I reiterated the Ukraine's strategic foreign policy objective, that is to join NATO, is irreversible. I informed the members of the Alliance about the internal process of creating a new coalition of democratic forces in the Ukraine which will eventually form the government. This is not an easy task and I informed friends and partners from NATO about this, about our vision of covering this road until the formation of a new government. The major principle we are following - and I informed members of NATO - in Ukraine, is position and programs before the polls. At the moment we are at the stage of agreeing in principle on re-establishing orange coalition and this fact was proven by the signing of protocol April 13th. Last Monday we agreed, three political forces, that what sequence we will follow in order to reach our objective. We, during the meeting, we expressed the hope that Ukraine will be invited to join Membership Action Plan this year in order to begin the cycle as of September this year. Our strategic objective is to get an invitation to join NATO, hopefully in 2008. We understand that we have to do a lot of homework in order to increase the public awareness of NATO-Ukraine co-operation and in order to increase the public support for NATO membership. I would like to say that I informed the members of the Alliance about our intention to continue our contribution in NATO-led operations in Kosovo, Active Endeavour in Mediterranean, in Sudan, and also I would like to inform you that we are in the process of very intensive consultations as to the format and possible contribution of Ukraine in operation in Afghanistan. So this is all I wanted to inform you about and I'm ready to answer your questions. MODERATOR: The first one was there. Q: Thank you James. My name is Victor Royanuk(?). I represent Ukraine News Agency UNIAN. Mr. General Secretary and Minister of Foreign Affairs Minister Tarasyuk, what do you think about (inaudible)... in NATO and could Ukraine receive new signals in Riga Summit? Thank you. DE HOOP SCHEFFER: That is part of the ongoing discussions, but I should once again stress that ministerial meetings, this was an informal one, but also formal ministerial meetings or a summit in Riga, as such cannot be directly linked to a process which is performance based and Minister Tarasyuk was quite rightly referring to the homework. When Ukraine is ready, NATO is ready, would be my answer. And when Ukraine is ready, and I think we fully agree here, that is of course to be decided later. That depends on the speed of the further reform. That would be answer. And by the way, that is... when a nation is ready, NATO is ready, that is of course not something which is specific for Ukraine, but as a tried to say yesterday at the press conference, that goes for the NATO enlargement process more in general as well. TARASYUK: Well we take the position of NATO as to the possible membership quite logical and understandable that the NATO Ministers would like to wait until the new government be created in Ukraine and to hear from this government the confirmation of NATO membership objective and I hope that this will be the case. Thank you. APPATHURAI: Last question. Q: Thank you. My name is (inaudible), Bulgaria. I have a question to Mr. Foreign Minister. Mr. Tarasyuk, following the example of Bulgaria and Romania, would you accept in case of being of course a member of NATO, would you accept to have U.S. base on your territory or NATO bases? Thank you. TARASYUK: This is a very hypothetical question to pose at this moment to Ukraine. I think that we have to follow the logic of our accession process and this issue in practical terms may not be raised earlier than 2010. I don't think that it is time, proper time to answer that.