Leaders of the 30-member NATO Monday committed to enhance relations with the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and stressed that the role of the NATO-Istanbul Cooperation Initiative (ICI) centre in Kuwait will be expanded for education and training.
“We will leverage the NATO-ICI Regional Centre in Kuwait as an important hub for education, training, and public diplomacy activities,” said the leaders in the Brussels Summit Communique released after their one-day meeting in Brussels today.
“We will continue to engage with the African Union and further develop our relations with the League of Arab States and the Gulf Cooperation Council in order to enhance our ability to better address mutual security concerns,” said the lengthy 79-point communique.
“We are committed to enhancing our long-standing engagement in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. We will strengthen our political dialogue and practical cooperation with our Mediterranean Dialogue (MD) and Istanbul Cooperation Initiative (ICI) partners. This will build stronger security and defence institutions and capacities, promote interoperability, and help to counter terrorism,” it said.
NATO opened the Centre in Kuwait in 2017. The Istanbul Cooperation Initiative includes Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and the UAE.
The communique went on to say that NATO has upgraded its defence capacity building assistance to Jordan to include additional counter-terrorism support, and have contributed to the establishment of the new Military Women’s Training Centre.
“We will continue our engagement with Tunisia on defence capacity building,” it said and added that “we remain open to the potential establishment of other education and training centres with interested MENA countries.” It said that the crisis in Libya has direct implications for regional stability and the security of all Allies. “We welcome the progress achieved in Libya, including the recent endorsement of the interim Government of National Unity and Presidency Council,” it said.
“NATO and Allies support Iraq in its fight against ISIS/Da’esh and terrorism in all its forms and manifestations. We commend the Government of Iraq and the Iraqi Security Forces for their continued efforts to combat ISIS/Da’esh. Based on a request from the Iraqi Government, we will strengthen our support to Iraq through our NATO Mission Iraq,” it said.
The Communique said that “we are committed to ensuring that Iran will never develop a nuclear weapon. We welcome the substantive discussions between Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPoA) participants, and separately with the United States, to accomplish a mutual return to compliance with the JCPoA by the United States and Iran.”
Source: Kuwait News Agency