Special Representative
To:
PA President
and
PA Secretary General
June 12, 2017
PC Brief Week 22/23, 2017
During these two weeks, there have been meetings by the Permanent Council (PC) and the
Forum for Security Cooperation (FSC), the Contact Group with the Asian Partners for Coop-
eration, the Preparatory Committee (PrepCom), the Advisory Committee on Management
and Finance, the 2nd meeting of the IWG Structured Dialogue in Capitals Format
“Trends
in
Military Force
Posture”,
an Ambassadorial Retreat, and many other informal meetings and
gatherings. In addition, PA Vice President Harstedt held a meeting with the Permanent Mis-
sion of Belarus to the OSCE. Staff from the Liaison Office also participated in PA President
Muttonen’s
retreat on National Minorities in Villach (Austria).
The most important result: the PC finally adopted the 2017 OSCE Budget. Almost half a year
into 2017 the OSCE institutions and missions can now start new projects (including the re-
cruitment of staff), which they will have to finish by November to do the accounting. The PC
also extended the mandate of the OSCE Programme Office in Dushanbe, which, however,
must close down all field offices. Other than that, the SG presented the
“Program
Outline
2018” - a kind of a political guideline for the drafting of the budget. Furthermore, the usual
briefings/reports were presented and
“Current Issues”
were discussed. From a PA perspec-
tive, it was remarkable how the head of the field presence in Uzbekistan along with many
ambassadors highlighted the importance of PA President
Muttonen’s
visit to Uzbekistan. Ad-
ditionally, in the talking points he circulated, SG Zannier reported about the
PA’s
visit to Tur-
key. I added the
PA’s
condolences to a series of statements regarding the terrible terrorist
attack in Kabul.
The OSCE Chairmanship also made an effort to get an agreement on the four open posts for
the most senior OSCE officials (Secretary General - SG, ODIHR, High Commissioner on
National Minorities
–
HCNM, and the Representative on the Freedom of the Media
–
RFoM).
Out of the lists of candidates that I have reported about, they proposed for SG former PC
Chair Amb. Greminger (Switzerland), for ODIHR Ms. Gisladottir (Iceland), for RFoM Mr. Désir
(France) and for HCNM Mr. Packer (Canada). These decisions having been proposed all at
the same time, with some delegations not accepting one decision without the others, this has
created some confusion. Because, as a package, it could be considered as quite imbal-
anced. However, the Chair as well as other Western delegates insist that this is not meant as
an offer for a
“package deal”,
but based on the merits of the candidates only. At the same
time, it is obvious that several countries are holding
“their”
candidates in reserve, and others
are still reluctant to make their position generally known. Despite all this, the Chairmanship
will make another attempt to reach consensus this week, mainly motivated by the urgency of
the matter and the fact that nobody raised strong objections against any of the four individual
candidates.
The second meeting of the
“Structured Dialogue”
in capitals format
“Trends
in Military Force
Posture”
was again well attended. This time, the PA had a seat at the table. It was less po-
lemical and more to the subject matter than the previous meeting. It also made it very clear
how difficult it has become in the times of 21st century military strategies to qualify military
strength, a comparison which would be the prerequisite for confidence and security-building
measures.
Andreas Nothelle
Ambassador