ARMENIAN FOREIGN MINISTER HAILS OPENING OF NATO INFORMATION CENTRE IN YEREVAN

Mediamax news agency
12 Mar 07

Yerevan, 12 March: The ceremony of the official opening of the NATO
Information Centre in Yerevan took place in Yerevan today. Armenian
Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanyan and NATO Assistant Secretary-General
for Public Diplomacy Jean Fournet participated in the ceremony.

Speaking at the opening ceremony, Jean Fournet stated that the process
of informing the public on the North-Atlantic Alliance, trends in its
activities and its tasks is "absolutely essential, if we want to get
the right idea about NATO’s agenda".

Jean Fournet noted that NATO is in the process of constant
transformation to be able to react to the new challenges and security
threats, and important steps in this direction is the establishment of
the Partnership for Peace programme and the Euro-Atlantic Partnership
Council.

"Our special partnership with Armenia is steadily developing," Jean
Fournet stated, noting that one of the tasks of the NATO Information
Centre is to inform the public on the various aspects of cooperation
between Armenia and the alliance.

"This centre will also be a place for debates and dialogue on issues
of security and new challenges," the NATO assistant secretary-general
stated.

Armenian Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanyan spoke today about the
important role of the NATO Information Centre in Yerevan.

The Armenian foreign minister stated that "we are very happy to
officially open the centre today".

"The centre has been functioning for some time now and has already
proven that there is a need for it. The establishment of such a
centre is one of the items in the IPAP [Individual Partnership Action
Plan] and I am very pleased that we implemented the item during the
first year of the implementation of this document. This is a very
significant step, as by means of the centre, together with NATO, we
will be providing true information on the alliance, its activities
and cooperation with Armenia," the Armenian foreign minister stated.

Vardan Oskanyan noted that "for some understandable reasons, the
perception of the alliance in our society does not to its fullest
correspond to the new, transformed NATO".

"NATO today is not the bloc that existed during the ‘cold war’. Many
things have changed in international activities, and NATO has managed
to adapt to the new realities. However, in our society there are
still some elements of a way of thinking peculiar to the ‘cold war’,
and thus there arises the need to provide truthful information,"
Vardan Oskanyan stated.

According to the foreign minister, this is of special importance
to Armenia, which, as opposed to other post-Soviet states, conducts
complementary foreign policy, closely cooperates on security issues
with Russia, is a member of the CSTO [Collective Security Treaty
Organization that unites Russia, Belarus, Armenia, Kazakhstan,
Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan] and deepens its relations with
the NATO within the framework of the IPAP.

"Our policy in recent years is evidence that there are no
contradictions between these trends," Vardan Oskanyan stressed.

[Mediamax news agency, Yerevan, in English 1112 gmt 12 Mar 07 quoted
Oskanyan as telling a briefing at the NATO Information Centre that
membership of NATO is not on Armenia’s foreign policy agenda.

Mediamax news agency, Yerevan, in English 1116 gmt 12 Mar 07 quoted
Fournet as telling the briefing that Azerbaijan’s membership of NATO
is not on the agenda.]