Baku, Azerbaijan 3 July 2006

Opening session of Melange workshop by Dr. Chris De Wispelaere, Head Collaborative Programmes Section Science for Peace Programme Director NATO, Public Diplomacy Division News 03/07/06 - NATO NATO week in Azerbaijan 26/04/06 - NATO Science Melange disposal project to be launched in Azerbaijan Mr. Minister, Ladies and Gentlemen, On behalf on NATO, and in particular the Security through Science Programme of the Public diplomacy division, it is an honor and a great for me to welcome you here at these two days dealing with Melange conversion. A very warm welcome especially to the representatives Georgia, Ukraine, Tajikistan and Kazakhstan, countries which in the past have either dealt with mélange conversion or will have to deal with mélange conversion in the near future. We are also very happy to have with us representatives of OSCE, exactly one year after our joint workshop in Ukraine . I hope that the exchanges with this prestigious organization which we will have the coming days, will result in strengthening our collaboration for the benefit of the partner countries. And of course it is nice to be back here and meet with the so many people with whom we have built up not only a collaborative relation but also a warm friendship. Last week in Kazakhstan the minister of environment said the following: ‘when you first meet you get to know each other, the second time you become friends and the third time you become relatives’. In this perspective, I think that we have in this room a real family joint together. Let me now say a couple of words about NATO. NATO is of course known essentially as a powerful military and political organization. Military and political aspects are therefore identified as the first and second dimension of NATO. During the cold war NATO was mainly a defense organization to counterbalance to the Warsaw pact, but nowadays, as a result of recent events in the world, it has become essentially a security organization. This is illustrated by NATO’s most recent achievements of peace keeping in Afghanistan , of capacity building in Iraq , of providing logistic support to secure the population of Darfur in Africa , of assisting local population after the earthquake in Pakistan . These achievements are examples of NATO’s first and second dimension, the military and political dimension. Only a very limited number of people are aware of the fact that NATO has a third dimension, based on article 2 of the North Atlantic Treaty, which explicitly highlights NATO’s role to promote overall well-being, to promote socio-economic development and solidarity among nations. This article 2 of the Treaty is in fact the basis of our get together here in Baku . Indeed, implementing this third dimension has resulted, now nearly 50 years ago, in the creation of NATO’s science programme, a programme of cooperation under the slogan “Bringing scientists together for Progress and Peace’ And just as NATO has changed over the past decades, also its Science Programme has changed. It has in fact changed in two ways: While initially, this third dimension was focused on the NATO member states only, since the early 1990’s this third dimension is especially targeting NATO’ Partner countries and more recently the Mediterranean Dialogue countries, in this way creating a co-operative network of over 50 nations. While initially it was the objective to promote the development of science and technology in NATO countries as a balance to the developing technologies of the Warsaw pact countries, the programme has now been transformed in a collaborative programme with all countries, in an effort to promote security and peace through collaboration in science and technology. And of course, R&D in defense against terrorism is one of the fields which is particularly encouraged. At this very moment, hundreds of scientists and researchers of all these nations collaborate with financial support of NATO in topics such as: Rapid Detection of CBRN Agents and Weapons, and Rapid Diagnosis of their effects on people Physical Protection against CBRN agents Decontamination of CBRN agents and Destruction of CBRN agents and weapons (e.g., chemical and vaccine technologies) Explosive Detection Computer Terrorism Countermeasures But security is much more than just protection from terrorism. Security is a global concept, including of course a terrorist free environment, but also and – maybe most importantly – focusing on conditions of living allowing development and well-being of all citizens. Therefore our Security through Science Programme encourages collaboration in this broad security concept. We now find in our activities exchanges of experts, workshops and projects in fields such as: Food Security Management of Non-Renewable Resources Information Security Human and Societal Dynamics (e.g. new challenges for global security, economic impact of terrorist actions, risk studies, topics in science policy) But the most striking element in the new concept of global security is ‘Environmental security’. As the term ‘environment’ is already very difficult to define, it is even more difficult to give a precise definition of ‘environmental security’ and I will therefore not try to do this here. I will limit myself to just pointing out that until no more than three years ago we had at NATO a meeting with broad NATO staff on the relation between environment and security. For many NATO participants this was something very new and many wondered why NATO should be involved in environmental security. The same phenomenon was true for other international organizations. However, just a couple of years later, things have changed; environmental security is on the NATO agenda and on the agenda of other organizations and it is generally accepted at all levels. It is now normal that NATO, the world’s largest security organization deals in its civil co-operation programme with topics such as: Desertification and land erosion Water Resources Management Earthquake risks Disaster Forecast and Prevention Nuclear and toxic waste The project on mélange conversion must be seen in this broad concept of environmental security. Storage of mélange is not a military or political problem; it is an environmental security problem as it involves risks to the environment and to the population. Destruction of mélange oxidizer is therefore a priority for NATO in its collaboration with some of the partner countries. Through the Azerbaijan project we hope to demonstrate an efficient, safe and environmentally friendly technology for the conversion of the oxidizer. The ultimate goal is indeed to make all Partner countries mélange free. To achieve this goal NATO is, in an association of the Science for Peace Programme and NAMSA, prepared to work with all other international organizations sharing the same concern. Let me conclude this brief introduction by thanking on one hand the Azeiri authorities for their hospitality and their assistance in organizing this event, but especially I would like to thank Prof. Spyra and Prof. Efendiev for their joint efforts in putting together this workshop.