Ladies and Gentlemen,

Thank you for inviting me to attend this meeting and for offering me the opportunity to highlight what the Stability Pact is doing concerning Security Sector Reform and how we cooperate with our international partners in this area, and especially with DCAF.

The number of people here today shows how important and broad the subject of this meeting is, how DCAF succeeds in bringing together a wide range of institutions and individuals working on many different areas, and also reminds us of the importance of coordinating our efforts.

As you know, Security Sector Reform in SEE is a multi-facetted subject area, with many recent steps forward, but also with many remaining challenges, where regional and other types of international cooperation would be needed.

In the course of more than five years, the emphasis within this general objective of promoting regional stability has, however, been shifting from demilitarisation measures and confidence building in a post-conflict situation, towards helping the region to catch up with its European neighbours on economic and social development, on having an open society where the rule of law prevails and with good neighbourly relations with open, well managed borders. A lot of progress has indeed been made and, perhaps to our own surprise, we find ourselves now in the midst of paving the way for the SEE countries towards becoming associates and perhaps even partners in the major European and Euro-Atlantic institutions.

After the challenging 90s, Western Balkans are in the good position to improve security and the most important is the comprehensive reform of national security sectors, which requires the fundamental transformation of the inherited armed forces and democratic civil control and public oversight of the complete security sector.

To obtain progress and tangible results in the reform of the Security Sector, political will to introduce the necessary reforms is crucial and needed on a long-term period. Regional cooperation and initiatives, such as exchanging best practices among the relevant actors as well as financial support by the international community should help to strengthen the political momentum to overcome existing internal obstacles to such reforms. Support programs to enhance political and parliamentary control over the military sector and the reform processes within SEE Ministries of Defence are, therefore, an indispensable part, as well as measures to cushion the social consequences of major reductions in armed forces and military infrastructure.

Security Sector Reform should be an integrated process involving the government, the militaries and the parliament. This process indeed is, to a very large extent, an economic and social issue and, accordingly also needs to be dealt within the context of economic reconstruction and social development policies. Therefore, training and involving the people in all the relevant fields, is an issue to be addressed.

The challenges of reintegration of former military personnel, conversion of former military bases, and restructuring military industry by conversion of redundant military facilities to civilian purposes are, in our opinion, an integral part of overall Security Sector Reform. The key questions here are how to restructure and downsize military forces and the military-related sector, adapting them to the new security situation and the economic realities of the SEE region, to possible new roles as partners in international peace keeping structures, and all of this again in the light of decisions on the enlargement of both EU and NATO. Some reforms are currently being prepared or are being implemented in most countries of the region.

Recently, the Ministers of Defence of the South East European Cooperation Process (SEECP) met during a Conference in Bucharest and agreed on regional cooperation on defence conversion, i.e. sharing information and experience, seeking international expertise and financial support.

International donors are already supporting defence conversion projects: NATO, IOM, OSCE, DCAF, the Council of Europe Development Bank with expertise; bilateral donors, such as UK , US, NL, Nordics with expertise and project money. The EU Commission and Council Secretariat do not have a clear policy and tend to stay away from the subject and this is the reason why the assumption that defence conversion is mainly a defence issue should be corrected. A final word on defence conversion process could go to DCAF to thank them for their outstanding contribution in the follow-up of the Bucharest Ministerial Conference, and their efforts to promote a better coordination between the international partners involved in the process. 

Another issue that is addressed in the framework of the Security Sector Reform is the proliferation of Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALW). This issue is an international policy objective of all EU member states. The SP pursues the objective of developing a coordinated regional approach to fight the excessive and uncontrolled flow of Small Arms and Light Weapons in the SEE region, therefore contributing to improve Human Security. SEESAC, the Belgrade-based South Eastern Europe Clearinghouse for the Control of Small Arms and Light Weapons (SEESAC), a joint project of UNDP and the Stability Pact, is the leading actor in the field of combating the threat of uncontrolled and excess SALW in the SEE region.

The sound management of the borders and their security is also an issue to be addressed. Whether we speak of withdrawing the militaries from the borders and replacing them with civilian personnel, upgrading the information systems, training personnel or improving cross-border operational cooperation among the countries, we continue dealing with a part of the overall Security Sector Reform. And once again, this issue cannot be addressed with one single pattern and one single solution. Because talking about borders is also touching upon issues like trans-border crime, illegal migrations, trafficking, threats of terrorism, the necessity of cross-border cooperation among the various police bodies and among the custom administrations. The reforms that the countries of the Western Balkans are committed to implement are part of the prerequisites for their eventual integration into the EU. The Ohrid Process for Border Management and Security, a joint effort by the countries of the region, the EU, the OSCE, NATO and the Stability Pact addresses this very sensitive issue. DCAF, which attends the meetings as an observer, remains an important partner for the SP in border management issues, as it has a deep and valuable knowledge of the situation in the countries concerned, and I am glad that the SP WT III and DCAF experts can cooperate on that matter (though coordination of activities can always be improved).

When dealing with Security Sector Reform, one can also talk about issues such as the fight against organised crime, and corruption for example. The SP WT III, through its initiatives SPOC and SPAI, closely works with the countries of the region to tackle these issues. Because the reform of the security sector also implies that the countries have the political will and the means to adapt themselves to the new threats of their security environment, and not only that they face the military challenges.

The SECI Regional Centre for Fighting Trans-border Crime has entered into a new phase following the EU assessment, which provides that it couldprogressively develop into a regional office of EUROPOL. To ensure the regional political commitment we are working with the South-eastern Cooperation Process - SEECP and their summit of 11 May will address the SECI Centre reform in particular.

We expect that our international partners will use SPOC and SPAI as regional instruments, in any future planning for SEE.

Once more, and finally, I would like to thank our partners in DCAF for their expertise, their commitment and their support, and would like to reiterate that the SP will continue working closely with DCAF. I wish you all a fruitful meeting. Thank you.