‘Kuwait center for better Gulf ties’
NATO focus on post Cold War challenges
BRUSSELS, March 13, (KUNA): NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg presented here Monday his annual report for the year 2016 which highlights how NATO is adapting to the new security environment by strengthening its collective defence and projecting stability beyond its borders.
“At no time since the end of the Cold War NATO has faced greater challenges to our security than it has today,” he said presenting the 121-page report at a press conference.
The report shows how much NATO is doing to adapt to this new security environment, acting with determination, to strengthen our collective defence and to project stability beyond our borders, and contributing to the fight against terrorism.
He noted that the 28-member Alliance has also started training Iraqi forces and also sent mobile training teams to Egypt, Jordan, Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia.
NATO AWACS planes are supporting the Global Coalition to Counter-ISIL, he noted.
“To bolster our efforts in the Middle East and North Africa we have recently decided to establish a Hub for the South in our command in Naples. We have opened the NATO-ICI regional centre in Kuwait, to improve cooperation with our partners in the Gulf,” said Stoltenberg.
The annual report noted that NATO continued to work last year with countries in the Gulf region through the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative (ICI), improving dialogue and increasing practical cooperation.
Activities in 2016 were conducted in areas including education and training, energy security, cyber defence, non-proliferation and arms control, maritime security, civil emergency planning, and the exercise planning process.
Seven mobile
training
courses were conducted in ICI countries in fields such as civil-military cooperation, military aspects of civil emergency planning and exercise planning.
Meanwhile, in another development, the 60th session of the United Nations Commission on Narcotic Drugs (UNCND) kicked off Monday with participation of ministers, senior officials, and specialists from around the world, including Kuwait.
The participants are to discuss several important subjects during the session, including implementation of the Political Declaration and Plan of Action of 2009 and Plan of Action on International Cooperation towards an Integrated and Balanced Strategy to Counter the World Drug Problem, in addition to following the outcomes of UN General Assembly’s 30th Special Session on World Drug Problem.
For his part, Kuwait’s Ambassador to Austria and permanent delegate to the UN and International Organizations’ headquarters in Vienna Sadeq Marafi stated to KUNA that UNCND is celebrating this year its 60th anniversary, adding the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) established CND to assist it in supervising the application of the international drug control treaties.
The General Assembly also expanded the mandate of the CND to enable it to function as the governing body of the UNODC, Marafi added, noting that ECOSOC resolution 1999/30 requested the CND to structure its agenda with two distinct segments; a normative segment for discharging treaty-based and normative functions, and an operational segment for exercising the role as the governing body of UNODC.
Kuwait was at the forefront of signing and ratifying the UN’s three main anti-drugs treaties out of its faith in the international cooperation’s importance in that regard, the Kuwaiti diplomat mentioned.
He also stressed his country’s keenness on taking part in CND’s annual sessions to gain experiences and participate in making decisions that are in line with the country’s directions and policies in security, health, precautionary, and medical treatment fields.