60 years of parliamentary diplomacy - NATO PA PA TIMELIN… · Technical. Although committee titles...
Transcript of 60 years of parliamentary diplomacy - NATO PA PA TIMELIN… · Technical. Although committee titles...
60 years of parliamentary diplomacy
1955 2015
60 years of parliamentary diplomacy
The idea of engaging Alliance Parliamentarians in collective deliberations on
the problems confronting the transatlantic partnership first emerged in the
early 1950s.
The Assembly’s creation reflected a desire on the part of legislators to give
substance to the premise of the Washington Treaty – particularly Article 2 –
that NATO is as an Alliance of democracies.
Sir Geoffrey de Freitas (United Kingdom)
President of the North Atlantic Assembly 1977-1978As early as 1951, he called for the Assembly of
the Council of Europe to be transformed into
an Atlantic Assembly which, he believed,
should have a formal consultative role within
NATO.
Senator Guy Gillette (United States)
In 1952, he was a participant in the
meeting between American and Canadian
legislators which unanimously called for the
creation of a NATO parliamentary Assembly.
Mr Finn Moe (Norway)
Chairman of the Norwegian Parliament’s Foreign
Affairs Committee, and one of the co-organizers of the first Conference of Members of Parliament from the NATO Countries
In 1953, at the Copenhagen International Study
Conference on the Atlantic Community, he
drafted the resolution which called for the
creation of an advisory conference of NATO
parliamentarians.
The first “Conference of Members of Parliament from the
NATO Countries” was held at NATO Headquarters at the
Palais de Chaillot in Paris on 18-22 July 1955, bringing
together 158 parliamentarians from 14 NATO nations.
The conference elected Senator Wishart McL. Robertson
of Canada as its President, and agreed to establish a
Continuing Committee – the precursor of the Standing
Committee – consisting of the President, three vice-
Presidents, and one representative from each delegation.
It also decided to appoint a small, part-time secretariat,
initially based in London until it moved to Paris in 1960.
.
60 years of parliamentary diplomacy
In 1956, the NATO Committee of Three’s Report on Non-Military Cooperation
in NATO recommended closer relations between NATO and the
parliamentary conference.
58. (…) the formation of national Parliamentary Associations and the activities of the Conference
of Members of Parliament from NATO countries have contributed to the development of
public support for NATO and solidarity among its members.
59. In order to maintain a close relationship of Parliamentarians with NATO, the following
arrangements are recommended:
a. that the Secretary General continue to place the facilities of NATO Headquarters at the
disposal of Parliamentary Conferences and give all possible help with arrangements for
their meetings;
b. that invited representatives of member governments and the Secretary General and
other senior NATO civil and military officers attend certain of these meetings. (…).”
Committees were established during the second conference in
1956.
In 1958, the number of Committees was set to five – Economic,
Cultural Affairs and Information, Military, Political, and Scientific and
Technical.
Although committee titles and terms of reference have evolved
over the years, this basic structure remains today.
The 12th Conference unanimously agreed to rename theorganisation as the North Atlantic Assembly.
In December 1967, the North Atlantic Council (NAC) authorised the NATO
Secretary General to strengthen co-operation with the Assembly.
Since then, the NATO Secretary General addresses Assembly sessions, and
responds in writing to the recommendations and resolutions adopted by the
Assembly.
Following France’s withdrawal from NATO’s military structure in 1966, NATO
and the NAA moved their respective headquarters from Paris to Brussels
The leaders of Allied governments, in their Declaration on
Atlantic Relations, recognised that:
“The cohesion of the Alliance has found expression not only inco-operation among their governments, but also in the freeexchange of views among the elected representatives of thepeoples of the Alliance."
This declaration endorsed the work of the Assembly without
mentioning it directly.
Leaders of the US Delegation, Senator Jacob Javits, Congressman
Wayne Hays with Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, greeting
Assembly member, Piet Dankert (Netherlands) and other members
In 1980, the Assembly began holding two plenary sittings each
year.
With the introduction of a plenary session in the spring in
addition to the autumn annual session, the pattern of Assembly
activities was set to remain largely unchanged until the end of
the Cold War.
60 years of parliamentary diplomacy
In the late 1980s, the Assembly reacted promptly to a
rapidly changing security environment.
By reaching out to Central and Eastern Europe, involving
legislators from countries in the region in co-operation and
dialogue, and assisting them in exercising effective
parliamentary oversight and control, the Assembly made a
vital contribution to the construction of a more stable,
secure and democratic Europe.
First Assembly visit to a former Warsaw Pact country.
The Sub-Committee on Central and Eastern Europe travels to Budapest at the invitation of the Hungarian National Assembly.
First Assembly visit to Moscow
At the Annual Session in London, the Assembly adopted Resolution 224 on ’New Regional Responsibilities for a Transformed Alliance’ which created the new status of ’associate delegation’.
This status allowed the integration of parliaments from Central and Eastern Europe into Assembly activities before the establishment of equivalent ties by NATO itself.
Assembly President Charlie Rose
(United States)with the leaders of the
delegations of the three newly
independent Baltic states taking their
place as associate delegations,
Madrid, 1991.
Then President of the Assembly Congressman Charlie Rose andSenator William Roth initiated a substantial programme of practicalassistance to the partner parliaments with a particular focus on thedevelopment of appropriate civil-military relations.
The Rose-Roth initiative remains today the Assembly’s primary toolfor engagement with delegations from non-NATO membercountries.
Charlie Rose William Roth
The first Rose Roth seminar was held in Lithuania in a tense
environment with Soviet troops still present in the country
Sandbags in the Lithuanian parliament as a precaution against
further violence, December 1991.
60 years of parliamentary diplomacy
In 1996, the
Assembly
established a
Mediterranean and
Special Group
(GSM), a forum for
co-operation and
discussion with
parliaments from
the Middle East
and North Africa.
Meeting of the Mediterranean Special Group with the Marrakech Chamber of Commerce, during a
visit to Morocco, April 2004.
Countries aspiring to become NATO members used the
Assembly as a channel to build support for their integration into
Euro-Atlantic structures.
The requirement for parliamentary ratification gave an additional
emphasis to Assembly debates on enlargement.
The Assembly was directly concerned with assisting in the
process of ratification of the Protocols of Accession signed at the
end of 1997, which culminated in the accession of the Czech
Republic, Hungary, and Poland to the Alliance in March 1999.
At the historic Madrid Summit, in which Czech Republic, Hungary,and Poland were formally invited to accede to NATO, thenNATO PA President, US Senator William Roth, addressed NATOHeads of State and Government.
The invitation from NATO leaders to Senator Roth represented atacit acknowledgement that the Assembly had played a key role inpaving the way to enlargement, and would have a central role inencouraging parliamentary ratification of enlargement.
Since then, NATO PA Presidents have been invited to address allNATO Summits.
In 1998, the Assembly established a Joint Monitoring Group with the Russian
parliament to oversee implementation of the NATO-Russia Founding Act and
a Joint Monitoring Group with Ukraine to oversee implementation of the NATO-
Ukraine Charter on a Distinctive Partnership.
The NATO-Russia Joint Monitoring Group at NATO
headquarters being briefed by senior NATO and
Russian military representatives, 1998.
In 1999, the North Atlantic Assembly was renamed as the
“NATO Parliamentary Assembly” to take into account the
profound transformation it had undergone since its creation.
NATO Press Service
file No. 16943-19
NATO Press Service
file No. 16938-05
The NATO PA created a New Parliamentarians Programme aimed
at giving new members of parliament or members of parliament
new to defence issues a better understanding of NATO’s
structures and processes
Visit to SHAPE, July 2004.
60 years of parliamentary diplomacy
The terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001 brought to the
forefront the new reality of the 21st century an unpredictable
world characterised by a new set of global challenges including
terrorism, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and
the emergence of lawless territories in “failed” and “failing states”.
As NATO adapts to these new challenges, the NATO
Parliamentary Assembly plays a key role in explaining the reality
and requirements of today’s security environment to citizens in
Europe and North America, and dispelling misperceptions about
NATO.
The US National Defence University hosted the first Parliamentary
Transatlantic Forum in Washington, the largest annual gathering
of European parliamentarians in the United States
Nancy Pelosi & John Tanner
In 2002, the NATO PA-Russia Joint Monitoring Group became the
NATO-Russia Parliamentary Committee;
The NATO-Ukraine Joint Monitoring Group became the Ukraine-
NATO Inter-parliamentary Council
Signing of a Co-operation Agreement
between the NATO Parliamentary
Assembly and the Russian Delegation
to the Assembly, October 2001.
At the Annual Session in November 2004 in Venice, Italy, which
marked the beginning of celebrations of the Assembly’s 50th
Anniversary, the entire North Atlantic Council for the first time
joined members of the Assembly for a special plenary
meeting.
The accession ceremony for the seven new NATO members,
Washington D.C. (USA), March 2004.
In 2003, NATO takes over command of the International Security Assistance
Force in Afghanistan (ISAF). As ISAF assists the new democratically elected
government of Afghanistan to re-establish control over its territory and rebuild its
security structures, the Assembly reaches out to the new Afghan Parliament.
The Assembly conducts its first official visit to Afghanistan in 2004, and in 2007, a
group of Afghan parliamentarians attends a NATO PA session of the first time.
Following the August 2008 conflict in Georgia, the
Assembly decided to strengthen its institutional
relationship with the Georgian Parliament by
creating the Georgia-NATO Inter-parliamentary
Council (GNIC).
Georgia became an Associate Member of the
Assembly in May 1999.
Through its cooperation with the Georgian
Parliament, the Assembly has supported Georgia’s
reform agenda, and its goal of eventual Alliance
membership.
In response to Russia’s aggression against Ukraine and
illegal annexation of Crimea, the Assembly expressed its
unambiguous support to the sovereignty, territorial
integrity, and political independence of Ukraine, and
withdrew Russia’s associate member status.
NATO’s Summit in Wales in September 2014 opened a
new chapter in the Alliance’s evolution in a security environment characterised by tensions to the East and growing
instability in the South. In this context, parliamentary support,
dialogue and diplomacy remain as important as ever.
1955-1956
Wishart Mcl
Robertson
1959-1960
Antoine Béthouart
1957-1959
Johannes J. fens
1956-1957
1969-1970
1975-1977
Wayne Hays
1960-1961
Nils langhelle
1961-1962
Pietro Micara
1964-1965
Henri Moreau de
Melen
1963-1964
Georg Kliesing
1962-1963
Lord Crathorne
1965-1966
José Soares da
Fonseca
1966-1967
Jean-Eudes Dubé
1970-1971
Romain Fandel
1968-1969
Kasim Gülek
1967-1968
Matthias A;
Mathiesen
1971-1972
C. Terrence
Murphy
1972—1973
John Peel
1973-1975
Knud Damgaard
Jack Brooks
1980-1982
1979-1980
Paul Thyness
1977-1979
Sir Geoffrey de
Freitas
1982-1983
Peter Corterier
1983-1985
Sir Patrick Wall
1992-1994
Loïc Bouvard1996-1998
William Roth
1994-1996
Karsten Voigt
1985-1986
Charles
McCMathias
1990-1992
Charlie-Rose
1988-1990
Sir Patrick Duffy
1968-1988
Tom Frinking
1998-2000
Javier Ruperez
2000
Tom Bliley
2000-2002
Rafael Estrella
2002-2004
Doug Bereuter
2007-2008
Jose Lello
2006-2007
Bert Koenders
2004-2006
Pierre Lellouche
2008-2010
John Tanner
2010-2012
Dr Karl A. lamers
2012-2014
Hugh Bayley
2014 -
Michael Turner
1955 2015
“All This"
by
Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)