Special Representative
To:
PA President
and
PA Secretary General
PC Brief Week 44, 2015
This week there were meetings of the Permanent Council (PC), the Forum for Security Co-operation, the Contact
Group with the Asian Partners for Co-operation, the Preparatory Committee (PrepComm), the Advisory Commit-
tee on Management and Finance (ACMF), a two-day Supplementary Human Dimension Meeting (SDHM) on the
OSCE’s Contributions to the Protection of National Minorities, and the “Security Days on Climate Change and
Security”. Roberto Montella was back in the office on Thursday after parental leave and a preparatory visit in Co-
penhagen.
The Permanent Council was addressed by the Chairman-in-Office of the South East European Cooperation
Council (SEECP), Bulgarian FM Daniel Mitov, and heard the ODIHR report about the HDIM. As usual, there was
a discussion about the effectiveness of this event. ODIHR Director Link underlined the good cooperation with the
PA and the role of the PA’s representative, Vilija Abramikiene, during the meeting. Besides the usual discussions
on Ukraine and related issues, which are heating up again, discussions under “Current Issues” also addressed
the ongoing protests in Montenegro, a recent Minsk Group Statement and the ongoing dispute between Azerbai-
jan and ODIHR Director Link about the ODIHR’s decision not to observe the Azerbaijani elections, because of the
restrictions regarding the size of the observation mission. Apparently, Azerbaijan wanted to negotiate with the
ODIHR a downsizing of the observation of the Azerbaijani elections to a small technical team. ODIHR’s non-
compliance with this request is now threatening to affect the discussions on the Unified Budget for 2016. ODIHR
Director Link was present and clarified that ODIHR remains ready to continue assisting Azerbaijan on electoral
matters with technical experts, but that sending a small expert team for election day would not be in line with es-
tablished OSCE election observation methodology. He was supported in this by the EU, the US, Canada and
Norway.
The FSC devoted its debate under the Agenda Item “Security Dialogue” to the Code of Conduct on Politico-
Military Affairs. Having been asked by the Norwegian FSC Chairmanship to take the floor after several presenta-
tions about ombudsmen for the Armed Services, I briefed the FSC about the long-standing support that the PA
has given to the issue and referred to the latest pertinent resolution at our Annual Session in Helsinki, as well as
the previous one on parliamentary oversight over the public and private security sectors (Baku 2014). The EU, in
its statement, welcomed the PA’s engagement.
The SHDM on 29 and 30 October dealt with the issue of national minorities in states, especially in the light of the
Copenhagen Document, the Bolzano/Bozen Recommendations and the Ljubljana Guidelines. Marc Carillet re-
ferred to the upcoming OSCE PA seminar on German-Danish Minorities in Germany and Denmark. The Security
Days Event on "Climate Change and Security : Unprecedented Impacts, Unpredictable Risks" precedes the Paris
Summit on Climate Change due to take place in early December. The discussion revolved around possible roles
for the OSCE after the Paris Summit. However, Climate Change is a topic that many delegations do not see as
part of the OSCE’s responsibilities. The minimum common denominator among participating States on this topic
is "Improving the environmental footprint of energy related activities in the OSCE Region". To some extent, the
event was used to propagate nuclear energy.
The discussions in the ACMF on the 2016 Unified Budget Proposal of 145.4 million Euros, proposing an increase
by 4.3 million Euros (+ 3 %), all of which goes to the Secretariat and the institutions, continue. However, the Spe-
cial Monitoring Mission in Ukraine has a separate 88.7 million Euros budget, which has caused a de facto in-
crease of the total spending of the OSCE by 61 %, more than doubling the expenditure on field operations.
Andreas Nothelle
Ambassador
November 2, 2015