78 members of the European Leadership Network have expressed support for the recent Task Force on Cooperation in Greater Europe position paper detailing new confidence and security building measures between Russia and the West.
The recent Task Force paper, available here, brings forward a very specific proposal, namely that:
- The NATO-Russia Council should be urgently convened to discuss a possible Memorandum of Understanding between NATO and its partners and the Russian Federation on Rules of Behaviour for the Safety of Air and Maritime Encounters between the two sides.
- Such a memorandum of understanding would be modelled on a similar memorandum signed between the United States and China in November 2014.
The agreement would:
- Set out the principles and procedures of communication that should be observed during encounters between military vessels and aircraft;
- Require each side to give timely hazard warnings if military exercises and live weapons firing are to take place in a vicinity where military assets of the other side are operational;
- Commit each side to communicate in a timely fashion about the manoeuvring intentions of military vessels and military aircraft.
Those European Leadership Network members now expressing support for this proposal are as follows:
UK
1. Menzies Campbell – Former Leader of the Liberal Democrats;
2. Charles Clarke – Former Home Secretary;
3. Nick Harvey – Former Minister of State for the Armed Forces;
4. John Kerr – Former Ambassador to the United States and the EU;
5. John McColl – Former Deputy Supreme Allied Commander Europe;
6. Tom McKane – Former Director General for Strategy and Security Policy, Ministry of Defence;
7. David Ramsbotham – Retired General Army, Former Adjutant General;
8. David Richards – Former Chief of the Defence Staff;
9. David Triesman – Former Foreign Office Minister;
10. William Wallace – Liberal Democrat Spokesman in the House of Lords;
11. Alan West – First Sea Lord and Commander in Chief of the Royal Navy;
12. Des Browne – Former Defence Secretary (Task Force Co-Chair);
13. Malcolm Rifkind – Former Foreign and Defence Secretary (Task Force Member);
14. Tony Brenton – Former Ambassador to Russia (Task Force Member);
France
15. Alain Coldefy – Former General Inspector of the French Armed Forces;
16. Bernard Norlain – Former Air Defense Commander and Air Combat Commander;
17. Alain Richard – Former Defence Minister;
18. Paul Quilès – Former Defence Minister (Task Force Member);
19. Michel Rocard – Former Prime Minister and current Ambassador of the Polar Regions
Germany
20. Wolfgang Ischinger – Chairman of the Munich Security Conference;
21. Angela Kane – Former UN High Representative for Disarmament Affairs & Under-Secretary-General;
22. Katja Keul – Member of the Bundestag and Current Member of the Defence Committee;
23. Walter Kolbow – Former Deputy Minister of Defence;
24. Klaus Naumann – Former Chief of Staff, Former Chairman of the NATO Military Committee;
25. Klaus Wittman – Former Bundeswehr general, Senior Fellow Aspen Institute;
26. Uta Zapf – Former Chair of Parliamentary Disarmament & Non-Proliferation Sub-Committee;
27. Volker Ruehe – Former Defence Minister (Task Force Member);
28. Gernot Erler – Special Coordinator for Russia Policy;
Russia
29. Alexander Bessmertnykh – Former Foreign Minister;
30. Anatloy Diakov – Director, Center for Arms Control, Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology;
31. Boris Pankin – former Foreign Minister of the USSR;
32. Sergey Rogov – Director of the Institute for US & Canadian Studies of the Russian Academy of Science;
33. Igor Ivanov – Former Foreign Minister, (Task Force Co-Chair);
34. Igor Yurgens – Chairman of the Board of the Institute of Contemporary Development, (Task Force Member);
35. Alexei Gromyko – Director of the Institute of Europe, Russian Academy of Sciences (Task Force Member);
36. Vyacheslav Trubnikov – Former Director of Russian Foreign Intelligence, (Task Force Member);
Italy
37. Giancarlo Aragona – Former Secretary General of the OSCE;
38. Paolo Cotta-Ramusino – Secretary General of Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs;
39. Carlo Trezza – Former Ambassador to the Republic of Korea
40. Carlo Schaerf – Former Professor of Physics at the University of Rome “Tor Vergata”;
41. Stefano Silvestri – Former Under Secretary for Defence & President of the International Affairs Institute;
Turkey
42. Mustafa Aydin – President of the International Relations Council of Turkey;
43. Vahit Erdem – Former Head of the Turkish Delegation to the NATO Parliamentary Assembly;
44. Faruk Loğoğlu – Former Undersecretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs;
45. Özdem Sanberk – Former Undersecretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Task Force Co-Chair);
46. Hikmet Cetin – Former Foreign Minister (Task Force Member);
Sweden
47. Hans Blix – Former Foreign Minister and former IAEA Director General;
48. Rolf Ekéus – Former Ambassador to the United States;
49. Henrik Salander – Former Ambassador to the Conference on Disarmament;
Finland
50. Jaakko Iloniemi – Former Ambassador to the United States;
51. Juhani Kaskeala – Former Chief of Defence;
52. Raimo Väyrynen – Former President of the Academy of Finland;
53. Jaakko Blomberg – Former Ambassador to Canada and Estonia;
54. Tarja Cronberg – Former Member of the European Parliament, (Task Force Member);
Poland
55. Adam Daniel Rotfeld – Former Foreign Minister (Task Force Co-Chair);
56. Sławomir Dębski – Director of the Centre for Polish-Russian Dialogue and Understanding;
57. Janusz Onyszkiewicz – Former Defence Minister and Chair, Executive Council, Euro-Atlantic Association;
Netherlands
58. Laurens Brinkhorst – Former Minister of Economic Affairs;
59. Jaap de Hoop Scheffer – Former Secretary General of NATO, Former Minister of Foreign Affairs;
Norway
60. Gro Brundtland – Former Prime Minister and former Director-General of the World Health Organisation;
61. Kjell Magne Bondevik – Former Prime Minister
Portugal
62. Ricardo Baptista Leite – Member of Parliament;
Denmark
63. Uffe Ellemann-Jensen – Former Foreign Minister;
Georgia
64. Tedo Japaridze – Member of Parliament and Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee;
Czech Republic
65. Jan Kavan – Former Deputy Prime Minister, Foreign Minister & President of UN General Assembly;
Spain
66. Narcis Serra – Former Minister of Defence and Deputy Prime Minister;
67. Javier Solana – Former NATO Secretary General & EU High Representative;
68. Ana Palacio – Former Foreign Minister (Task Force Member);
Hungary
69. János Martonyi – Former Minister for Foreign Affairs;
Albania
70. Fatmir Mediu – Former Minister of Defence;
Bulgaria
71. Soloman Passy – Former Chairman of the United Nations Security Council, former Foreign Minister;
72. Todor Tagarev – Former Defence Minister;
Romania
73. Ioan Paşcu – Vice-President of the European Parliament;
Austria
74. Wolfgang Petritsch – Former EU Special Envoy for Kosovo & High Rep for Bosnia & Herzegovina;
Croatia
75. Ivo Slaus – Former Member of Parliament, Former member of the Foreign Affairs Committee;
76. Budimir Loncar – Former Yugoslav Minister of Foreign Affairs;
Serbia
77. Goran Svilanović – Secretary General, Regional Cooperation Council;
Ireland
78. Eoghan Murphy – Member of the Irish Parliament.
The opinions articulated above represent the views of the author(s), and do not necessarily reflect the position of the European Leadership Network or any of its members. The ELN’s aim is to encourage debates that will help develop Europe’s capacity to address the pressing foreign, defence, and security challenges of our time.
