EWI Convenes Leaders from OSCE Countries to Ensure Euro-Atlantic Security
News | June 16, 2010

On June 16, 2010, EWI convened a consultation on Euro-Atlantic Security at the European Parliament in Brussels. The event, held in cooperation with the Justas Vincas Paleckis, a member of the European Parliament, was the inaugural meeting of EWI’s Eminent Person’s Group (EPG) for Euro-Atlantic Security and builds on EWI's previous work in this area.

The EPG is a group of former high-ranking political and military figures from countries in the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. The idea to set up the EPG was a recommendation of the EWI Experts Group and EWI's influential 2009 policy paper, Euro-Atlantic Security: One Vision, Three Paths.

The mandate of the EPG:

  1. To gain acceptance at high political levels within the OSCE and/or among its member states of new approaches to existing security disputes within the OSCE area;
  2. To identify appropriate responses, possibly through the creation of new mechanisms, to address security threats to OSCE members in a way that recognizes the principle of indivisible security across the OSCE area;
  3. To reconcile the demands of traditional security while addressing emerging threats, such as cyber attacks and other physical threats to international economic resilience (e.g. uncontrolled migration or bio-attack).

The main purpose of the EPG is to offer fresh ideas on Euro-Atlantic security to political leaders in private and sometimes in public. The EPG will operate both as a group that meets occasionally to discuss progress and as a cluster of individuals in conversation with other political leaders on a one-on-one basis to stimulate new ideas.