Security advisers from Poland, Baltic States on Ukraine, NATO, EU - News - National Security Bureau

14.07.2014

Security advisers from Poland, Baltic States on Ukraine, NATO, EU

The Ukrainian-Russian conflict, the European Union's security policy and the NATO summit in September were the topics of a meeting of presidential security advisors from Poland and the Baltic States held on Monday in Riga.

The representatives of Poland and the Baltic States worked on a joint position before the meeting of presidents of the region's countries planned for July 22 in Warsaw, National Security Bureau (BBN) head Stanislaw Koziej told PAP.

The purpose of the July 22 meeting, to be attended by the presidents of the Visegrad Group countries (Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary), the Baltic States (Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia) and Romania and Bulgaria, is to work out a joint stance for the NATO summit in September.

"We have almost identical views on almost all the issues," Koziej told PAP, listing the topics of the Monday meeting as the NATO summit, the Ukrainian-Russian conflict and the EU's security policy.

According to a BBN communique, the presidential advisors agreed that "NATO and the EU should pursue a consistent two-track policy towards the crisis, consisting in stopping Russia on the one hand and supporting Ukraine's statehood on the other."

Koziej told PAP that the four countries' representatives agreed that the Russian-Ukrainian crisis had to be viewed in terms of an event with a long-term impact on the region's security and not an incident that could be waited out.

The Baltic States and Poland share a similar list of priorities before the NATO summit, according to Koziej: strengthening NATO's eastern flank, regular updating and checking of contingency plans and building NATO infrastructure.

Apart from the BBN head, the participants of the Monday meeting were the Estonian president's security policy advisor Merle Maigre, the Latvian president's foreign policy advisor Margers Krams and the Lithuanian president's foreign policy advisor Martynas Lukosevicius. The guests were welcomed by Latvian President Andris Berzins.

The presidential advisors for security and foreign policy from Poland and the Baltic States have been meeting since 2013.

Source: PAP