The informal meeting has been traditionally held in the second week of January every year since 2008. This year, the Snow Meeting will take place on January 12 and 13 in the Paunguriai village, the district of Trakai. The Latvian, Estonian and Georgian Foreign Ministers Edgars Rinkēvičs, Sven Mikser and Mikhail Janelidze, NATO’s new Deputy Secretary General Rose Gottemöller Rose and the Secretary of State at the Polish President’s Chancellery Krzysztof Szczerski are expected to attend the meeting.
A total of about 90 high-ranking diplomats, advisers, parliamentarians, experts from analytical and research centers, as well as international and security policy experts from more than 20 countries, the EU and NATO institutions are also expected to attend the meeting.
The jubilee event will discuss the future of the transatlantic community after the United States presidential election, mood swings in the European and North American societies, the Russian challenge to international order based on the values of democracy, respect for human rights and the rule of law. The participants of the meeting will also discuss the implementation of decisions taken at the NATO Summit in Warsaw in July 2016 and other ways to strengthen the security of Alliance members in the face of conventional and hybrid threats. A separate session will discuss the benefits of closer NATO-EU cooperation.
