I would like to explicitly state at the outset what I hope you will see as the main thrust of my message and that is that building the so-called European security architecture must be a process of co-operation, inclusion, and transparency. The guiding principle in this process must be that peace and security in the Euro-Atlantic area are indivisible between East and West, as well as between Europe and America.
As we all know, the security environment has changed dramatically since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. The Warsaw Pact vanished, the Soviet Union collapsed, new democracies have taken root in Central and Eastern Europe. While some may pretend that the end of the Cold War brought an end to history, it certainly did not bring an end to crisis and conflict in Europe or beyond. For sure, the end of the Cold War brought a happy end to the East-West confrontation and the risk of a world devastating war. But at the same time, new threats have emerged.
Some old tensions are, indeed, revisiting the European continent, posing new challenges to peace and security. The tragedy of the Balkan war on the eve of the twenty-first century was a very sobering reminder to us all. During the Cold War, NATO offered Europe and America a strong and effective collective defense against the massive threat of Soviet forces. However, it was only after the Cold War that NATO forces were actually deployed in a real shooting war, when, as you know, NATO decided to intervene with its fire-power in order to stop the bloodshed in former Yugoslavia. A NATO-led coalition of forces, the so-called Implementation Force, or IFOR, is still on the ground today consolidating peace and security in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
And let me add that another coalition of forces is also on the ground in former Yugoslavia, and that is the United Nations operation in Eastern Slavonia. Belgium is contributing the military command and a sizeable number of soldiers to this operation. Our soldiers are there now, safeguarding peace and a multi-ethnic future in the area around Vukovar, where in 1991, war broke out between Serbia and Croatia before Bosnia was set ablaze. So much for the end of history.
Beyond Europe, as well, there are conflicts and tensions that threaten to risk our peace and security. Regional instabilities in the Middle East, Asia, and Africa are very much, and too often very violent, parts of the security environment in which we live. Just to bring to mind the operations of Desert Shield and Desert Storm, the United States led an international coalition of forces to restore the territorial integrity of Kuwait. Success in the Gulf War and success in former Yugoslavia both are true manifestations of the transatlantic partnership that was forged in the Cold War but is indeed proving to be alive and kicking well thereafter.
Security in the post-Cold War is also endangered by a new set of challenges. The risks posed by the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction are real. Belgium has been a strong advocate of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and is currently undertaking active diplomacy to promote a total ban on the inhuman weapons that are anti-personnel mines.
Furthermore, terrorism, international crime, and environmental hazards are real and direct challenges to our security. They may very well be the most difficult to deal with; they certainly will only be dealt with through global awareness and international cooperation.
The new security environment requires us to reshape and renew our tools, the instruments and institutions we have built over the years to promote peace and security. We have to shape a security architecture in which our new partners from Central and Eastern Europe, from Russia, Ukraine, and the new independent states find their rightful places; a security architecture also that enables us to cope with the new threats of the post-Cold War era.
Let me first say a few words about the new tasks, before focusing on the new partners to whom we are opening our transatlantic partnership, as well as in Europe, the European Union.
NATO is in the process of reshaping its structures. It is reorganizing its forces so that the Alliance can carry out more effectively the full range of missions, including the new missions of conflict prevention and crisis management, while preserving the capability for collective defense. The concept of Combined Joint Task Forces, or CJTF, will permit such flexible and mobile deployment of forces. CJTF is a multi-purpose concept that will serve the other priorities of the European security architecture as well, in particular the participation of non-NATO members in NATO-led operations and the strengthening of the European security and defense identity.
Integration of new partners within the European security architecture make it a "New Atlantic Community," as Secretary of State Warren Christopher said in his speech in Stuttgart on September 6. That is a, if not the, key priority of the post-Cold War era.
As we share the same values of democracy and the rule of law in open societies, we must also share the means to protect and promote our values. This, I think, is what the current enlargement processes are basically about. The core institutions of European peace and prosperity - NATO and the European Union - both are engaged in a process of outreaching, broadening, and deepening cooperation and integration.
Sharing values and the means to safeguard them is also the true vocation, the "raison d'etre," of such crucial organizations as the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (the OSCE0 and the Council of Europe. All have a role to play. The European security architecture is not a monolithic construction.
As we go along in the process of integration, we must be careful to make it truly cooperative, inclusive, and transparent. The first commandment of the new European security architecture should be: Thou shalt not create new dividing lines. The Iron Curtain has been lifted. Europe is today whole and free. It is now in our joint interest to extend to the east the structures and institutions that brought peace and prosperity to western Europe after World War II. Let me touch briefly on some of those structures and institutions: NATO, the OSCE, and the European Union.
In June of this year, the NATO ministerial in Berlin reaffirmed the commitment to open the Alliance to new members and to intensify the dialogue with interested countries to prepare for NATO accession. The perspective of a NATO Summit in 1997 has been raised as an opportunity to invite the several partners to begin accession negotiations.
In the meantime, NATO is ready to broaden and deepen dialogue and cooperation with partner countries by means of the outreach activities within the "Partnership for Peace" and the "North Atlantic Cooperation Council" (the NACC). These programs were specifically designed to reach out to countries that are not, or not yet, members of NATO.
The idea of an "Atlantic Partnership Council" to further expand the scope and substance of these programs has been put forward. The idea is promising, and we are eager to explore it among NATO allies. As I mentioned earlier, through CJTF, NATO also will be outreaching. It will provide for ways in which nations outside the Alliance will be able to participate in NATO-led operations.
Institution-building and structure-shaping, of paramount importance as they are, do not place the whole process of cooperation and integration on hold. Twelve partner countries of the "Partnership for Peace" have joined NATO in IFOR's mission in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The importance of this first common experience is hard to overestimate, for it is real and practical proof of security cooperation between and by members of NATO.
As we continue the process of opening the Alliance to new members, it is imperative that we keep NATO's door open to all countries that are able and willing to join, NATO's openness to new members is not a one-time-only event.
It is no less crucial that NATO further develop a strong, stable, and enduring partnership with Russia. Here, too, IFOR shows the way. Russia's contribution to IFOR underscores not only the ability of the Alliance to build practical new partnerships, but also Russia's essential role in the new security environment. IFOR shows the spirit and the commitment that exist to collaborate effectively on issues of European peace and security. I think it is really important that we achieve a political framework for NATO-Russia relations. This could well be a Charter that elaborates the basic principles for security cooperation and for the development of permanent mechanisms for consultation.
Another significant partner of NATO is Ukraine. As the NATO meeting in Berlin recognized, an independent, democratic, and stable Ukraine is one of the key factors of stability and security in Europe. We must develop our dialogue and cooperation further, giving more substance to the relationship. Ukraine is a participant in IFOR. And I can tell you that Belgium, a NATO member and leading nation in the U.N. Force in Eastern Slavonia, greatly values the Ukrainian contribution to that endeavor as well.
Less tangible and visible maybe, but most certainly no less important as a building block in the European security architecture, is the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the OSCE.
During the Cold War, when the Organization was still a Conference, the OSCE was a source of hope, vision, and encouragement for those in Europe trying to translate the Helsinki principles of democracy, the rule of law, and the respect of human rights into the real life of politics and society.
In a remarkable effort of renewal, the OSCE has shown the comparative advantage it has to offer to the new European security architecture after the Cold War and that is its comprehensive approach to security. All countries of the Euro-Atlantic area, from Vancouver to Vladivistok, are equal partners. The OSCE is also acting on the ground of real political life. It is setting up effective mechanisms and missions for the prevention, management, and resolution of conflicts. It is making important contributions to regional stability. Its current role in former Yugoslavia is crucial.
The OSCE will meet in December in Lisbon at the level of Heads of State and Government. I hope this Summit will strengthen OSCE's instrumental role and at the same time build on its basic principles to define a model of cooperative security for the twenty-first century.
The European Union has brought peace and prosperity to the countries of western Europe. It has developed into an anchor of stability. The European Union is also a work in progress. It is a process of creating an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe. Integration is the key word. In the present state of the Union, it implies two sets of challenges. The first challenge is to deepen the integration by strengthening the process and the substance of our common policy-making in all fields: agriculture, trade, economic and monetary policy, foreign affairs, and security. In the field of economic and monetary affairs, there will soon be more than a common policy. There will be a single European policy.
The second challenge is enlarging the European Union to the new democracies of Central and Eastern Europe as well as Cyprus and Malta. The European Union is strongly committed to opening its institutions and policies to the new members. We have already offered them the real perspective of membership, and by "real" I mean that we've developed pro-accession strategies so as to make sure both the Union and the will-be members are fully prepared to continue the success of European integration. Accession negotiations will start rather soon, not later than six months after the conclusion of the current Intergovernmental Conference which must enable the European Union to face the two challenges I just mentioned. The Conference is likely to end by mid-1997.
Broadening membership of NATO and the European Union is a historical imperative, and we will meet it. Another imperative, however, is safeguarding the fundamentals of the organizations, their goals, and their capacity to achieve them. The process of enlargement must, therefore, also be a process of strengthening. This applies also to NATO.
New members as much as current members who share the assets of security and defense must also be willing and able to share the burdens and responsibilities. NATO will not succeed in enhancing peace and security if the Alliance would weaken itself in the process.
In this respect, I would like to recall one of the fundamentals of NATO, as reaffirmed by the NATO declaration of Berlin in June 1996. That is to ensure the Alliance's military effectiveness so that it is able to perform its traditional mission of collective defense and to undertake its new roles in changing circumstances.
There are two other fundamentals of NATO, and they bring me to the next chapter of my speech: the partnership between Europe and America. The NATO declaration of Berlin indeed lists as the other NATO fundamentals: maintaining the transatlantic link and the development of the European security and defense identity.
I fully endorse the vision of President Clinton as expressed by Secretary of State Christopher in his speech in Stuttgart on the New Atlantic Community. This Community is based on three key elements: first, the United States being fully engaged in Europe; second, a more effective European Union taking up new members; and third, NATO remaining the central pillar of the American security engagement.
The joint commitment of Europe and America to peace and security in and beyond Europe has been of vital importance in the past, and it will be no less crucial in the future. To those who doubt it, I would like to point to the peacemaking operations during the Gulf War and in former Yugoslavia. In both cases, peace and security were achieved, and will only be maintained, throughout joint efforts and effective common will-power to safeguard the values we share.
To the lessons I have already mentioned to be learned from IFOR, the NATO-led cooperation in Bosnia and Herzegovina, I would like to add a final one. The Dayton Agreement brought the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina to an end. It also brought home the lesson that security in Europe is indivisible between Europe and the United States, and that security in Europe is a responsibility and burden we share.
The United States rightfully expects Europe to take its full share of the burden and the responsibility of our common commitment to peace and security. The United States counts on a more effective European Union in the New Transatlantic Community. Frankly speaking, I couldn't agree more.
The member states of the European Union are currently engaged in an Intergovernmental Conference in order to prepare the Union for the future, including enlarged membership and a stronger, more effective common foreign and security policy.
This endeavor should be and will be fully compatible with the work which NATO has started on the development of the European security and defense identity within the Alliance. CJTF, the multi-purpose concept again, will permit all European allies to play a larger role in NATO's command structures and military operations. It will empower the Western European Union, the WEU, with separable but not separate, military capabilities in operations led by the WEU. NATO itself has now set the stage for military forces that are coherent, effective, and capable of operating under the political control and the strategic direction of the WEU. Full transparency and complementary between NATO and WEU is rule number one for both organizations.
One of the tasks of the Intergovernmental Conference of the European Union is to make its common foreign and security policy more effective. Part of the effectiveness is to increase the capacity of Europe to share the burdens and responsibilities with America in the new European security architecture. To this end, conflict prevention and crisis management should be brought within the ambition of the European common foreign and security policy.
The European Union will not create its own apparatus of forces and assets. It will ask the WEU to act and implement European missions. As I explained earlier, the arrangements between NATO and the WEU will exclude any confusion of minds or duplications of efforts. We see the WEU as an integral part of the European integration embodied by the European Union. As it will come closer to the European Union and the Union itself will be playing a more important role in security matters, we must ensure transparency and effectiveness. I would suggest for further reflection that there is room for improving not only military channels across the Atlantic but political and diplomatic channels as well.
I would like to end by shifting the level of my approach. Peace and security is not only an affair between states, an affair in which our citizens are not daily or directly involved. There are some very real, direct, and daily threats to the security of our citizens - our men, women, and children. These are threats against which the grand European security architecture will offer no immediate safe haven. I referred to these threats at the beginning of my speech: terrorism, international crime, and environmental threats.
We must strengthen the structures for international cooperation to combat these transnational threats to our internal security, to the security of our citizens, our men, women, and children.
One of the darkest crimes, the sexual exploitation of children, has struck Belgium, causing immense pain and sorrow but also the firm resolution to combat it. Part of this worst kind of criminality are the international links through which it is often committed. To combat it, we have to act accordingly, that is, through international cooperation and joint action.
I believe the transatlantic partnership has meaning in this respect as well. Our common security architecture will forever be an unfinished construction if we do not make it a secure place for every man, woman, and child.