The informal meeting has been traditionally held in the second week of January every year since 2008. The Latvian, Estonian and Georgian Foreign Ministers – Edgars Rinkēvičs, Sven Mikser and Mikhail Janelidze – also NATO’s new Deputy Secretary General Rose Gottemoeller and the Secretary of State at the Polish President’s Chancellery Krzysztof Szczerski attended the meeting this year.
A total of about 120 high-ranking diplomats, advisers, parliamentarians, experts from analytical and research centres, as well as international and security policy experts from more than 20 countries, the EU and NATO institutions also took part in the meeting.
The jubilee event discussed the future of the transatlantic community after the United States presidential election, mood changes 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 also discussed the implementation of decisions of 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 discussed the benefits of closer NATO-EU cooperation.
