Fifth jubilee To Be Secure Forum starts in Budva: Montenegro makes significant progress towards NATO accession

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Budva, Montenegro (04 June 2015) – Under the auspices of the Government of Montenegro, the Atlantic Council of Montenegro has organised the fifth jubilee To Be Secure Forum, which started earlier today in Budva with an ice braking panel titled “Stability of Balkans strengthened by enlargement”. The panel was conducted by Political Director at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Hungary Levente Benko, academic and political analyst of Poland Jaroslaw Wisniewski and Permanent Representative of the Slovak Republic to NATO Tomaš Valašek.

The officials discussed the current situation in the Western Balkan, stressing that Montenegro has made significant progress when it comes to Euro-Atlantic accession process. The Western Balkan should be part of the NATO Alliance and the enlargement policy is basically the NATO soft power, the officials agreed.

Mr Benko underlined that the situation in Europe is at a critical moment which requires the entire region to join NATO. Montenegro has taken the leading role in that process and in meeting all the requirements, and hopefully it will get a NATO invitation letter by the end of the year, Mr Benko added.

The countries of the region need to carry out reforms in order to be supported by NATO. They should also behave as NATO member states even before joining the Alliance, the officials participating the panel discussed noted, at the same time commending Montenegro's efforts towards pursuing the important foreign policy goal. They also emphasised the fact that the entire region will benefit from Montenegro’s accession to NATO.