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Before commenting more specifically on issues related to regional cooperation, I wish to confirm Romania's agreement with the documents submitted to the Council for endorsement, particulary the EAPC Action Plan for 1998-2000. They reflect the important step forward in the enhancement of PfP activities which has to be commended. They also reflect that although the EAPC has been in operation for several months only, in my opinion it already projects a clear preoccupation to respond in practical and concrete forms to current challenges. This trend should be further encouraged.

  1. In order to do so one has to take into account at least the following aspects:
    • The Madrid Summit, by launching the enlargement process, opened very good prospects for NATO to be able to cope with the real and the new security challenge
    • It is of particular importance that NATO's enlargement converges with the general process of strengthening the Alliance. Facts are to be put in.

    The conclusions of the North Atlantic Council meeting of yesterday are encouraging in this respect. I am reffering in particular to paragraph 6 of the final communique of this meeting where the commitment to follow-up activities for implementing the paragraph 8 of the Madrid Declaration is clearly affirmed. I would like to recall that a special refference is made in that Declaration to Romania and Slovenia.
  2. Regional cooperation has emerged as a significant dimension of the stability and security in Europe and Romania has committed herself to be an active promoter of such a cooperation.

    It is true that it is Central Europe which primarily lends itself to and developed such a type of cooperation. But that was also an indication that the countries in the region feel perhaps more than others the need for enhanced security. It is absolutely normal therefore that regional cooperation should not be considered a local issue outside the concerns of the Euro-Atlantic world.

    • Romania welcomed the statement by the Madrid Summit in which the Alliance recognized the need to build greater stability, security and regional cooperation in the countries of Southeast Europe (as well as in the other parts of Europe); as a country situated in or close to that region it is fully committed to participate and contribute to such endeavors
    • Through local cooperation a region acquires its own identity. Southeast Europe reached already the institutionalization of some forms of regional cooperation. At present new ones are emerging. I have in mind the "trilateral cooperation arrangements" which have developed as a network over the region especially since the beginning of this current year.
    • The trilateral concept is generous in terms of opportunities which it opens for cooperation among neighbouring countries which join such arrangements; it is flexible and suitable for the identification of common interests; it ensures the creation in the region of solid pillars of mutual trust.
    • It was in that context that we welcomed the setting up within the EAPC of the open-ended Working Group on Southeast European cooperation. The work done by it up now is commendable.

      We believe that the EAPC should remaine seized by the regional topic while, at the same time, maintaining it in its proper context;

      • regional cooperation should respond to the national interests of the countries of the region as well as to the global concerns of Europe
      • it should not be considered a substitute for, but rather a framework for European and Euro-Atalntic integration;
      • it should not impede upon other forms of cooperation or on the unitary character of the EAPC objectives.
    • As to the future work of the EAPC in this area we envisage three basic challenges
      • First the EAPC needs to have a perspective and a vision. The list of topics retained by the Council after the first meetings of the Working group is a concrete step in that direction and Romania will actively participate in the work on them. As already agreed the Working Group should be maintained as an ad hoc body to be convened whenever necessary in order to generate proposals and ideas
      • Second from the point of view of the working methods, we believe that more through should be given to the modalities which would ensure a proper synergy between the cooperation which is begin developed locally, in the region and the work undertaken in the Council. It is important that the EAPC activities be correlated with the realities of the region and conversely the cooperation in the region be influenced by the work of the EAPC
      • Thirdly, one should be firm in preserving the practical and action-oriented character of the EAPC endeavors. In that respect one could foresee large possibilities if, for instance, one would look into the individual Partnership Programmes of the countries of the region with a view to identifying projects which could be suitable for harmonization at regional scale. In time, the IPP's could even contain chapters for multi-country cooperation.
    • In our view priority should be given to practical activities such as common exercises and the creation of crisis prevention structures. As known Romania has suggested the establishment of a regional conflict prevention and crisis management center. Since similar proposals have been made by other States in the region we would be ready to consult with them in order to coordinate our efforts
    • Finally, one could envisage extending the regional cooperation to areas less explored up to now. Cooperation on such issues as the combat against international terrorism, illegal trafficking of arms and proliferation of weapons of mass-destruction, especially of radioactive materials, would be more than appropriate.
  3. Coming back to the EAPC Action Plan, which I reffered to at the beginning of my adress, I have a few comments
    • Romania proposed the creation of an open-ended Working Group on "Financial Assessment and Planning of Defence Budgets and Expenditures" with sessions in Brussels and Bucharest, in order to deepen the discussions on this relevant subject
    • We appreciate the introduction of the new fields of cooperation like nonproliferation and fight against terrorism. In this respect we intend to propose the organization of an activity with the participation of the Proliferation Joint Committee in Romania in 1998
    • We welcome the fact that our proposal to organize in 1998 in Bucharest a meeting of the Political-Military Steering Committee in EAPC format on civil-military relations was taken into consideration by the International Secretariat. We will send soon our proposals for the agenda and the date of the meeting
    • We will continue to use PfP as an important vehicle for preparation for NATO membership and we are committed to focus on our priorities by launching concrete projects in fields like: infrastructure (through NATO Security Investment Programme), implementation of the CJTF concept, training of personnel for achieving NATO standards, etc
    • We support the proposal of establishing an Euro-Atlantic Disaster Response Coordination Center at NATO Headquarters. We are ready to contribute to the designed operational unit of this Center.
  4. Given the importance of the matter I will not end without reffering to Bosnian NATO-led operations. We welcome and support yesterday's NAC statement on SFOR. Romania is committed to continue its participation in SFOR and is ready to upgrade its presence in Bosnia next year. In addition to one infantry battalion as part of the Strategic Reserves, Romania is prepared to consider further contributions pending the decisions which will be adopted.