Portugal’s Foreign Minister says, furthering the dialogue on security issues is key priority of his country’s Forum for Security Co-operation Chairmanship

VIENNA, 15 September 2016 – Moving forward the dialogue between participating States on a number of current security challenges, including the crisis in and around Ukraine, arms control and confidence- and security- building measures, will be key priorities of Portugal’s Chairmanship of the OSCE Forum for Security Co-operation (FSC). Providing a platform for further discussions on gender equality in armed forces, as well as promoting the security dialogue in the Mediterranean region will also be high on the agenda.

In his opening remarks at the 828th meeting of the Forum for Security Co-operation yesterday Portugal’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Dr. Augusto Santos Silva, stated that “arms control and confidence- and security-building measures, including the Vienna Document and the Code of Conduct on Politico-Military Aspect of Security, remain integral to the OSCE’s comprehensive and co-operative concept of security”. He also said that his country welcomed the German OSCE Chairperson-in-Office’s initiative of re-launching discussions on arms control.

Foreign Minister Santos Silva stated that in October, in a common effort with the German OSCE Chairmanship, the joint meeting of the Permanent Council and the FSC will mark the 20^th anniversary of the 1996 Framework for Arms Control, adopted in Lisbon. “We will promote a discussion on what we have achieved in the past twenty years and what is still to be done concerning arms control,” said Santos Silva.       

The Portuguese FSC Chairmanship proposes to hold a set of security dialogues on different areas of the FSC work. One of them is a debate on the issue of the deactivation of small arms and light weapons. “It is an area of increased relevance, in particular having in mind that reactivated weapons have been recently used to carry out terrorist attacks,” Minister Santos Silva noted.

Portugal’s Foreign Minister Santos Silva also stressed that his country attaches great importance to “increasing the representation of women in the armed forces, including in decision making and in operations.”

Portugal’s FSC Chairmanship will also highlight an initiative that has been promoting security and defence co-operation in the Mediterranean region through mutual confidence and multilateral co-operation.

Portugal is taking over the Chairmanship of the Forum for Security Co-operation from Poland.