As GLOBSEC celebrates its 10th edition in June, Bratislava will host its largest diplomatic event
GLOBSEC will celebrate a decade since its establishment. Some 800 people from more than 70 countries, including heads of state, government and international organisations will gather in Bratislava from 19-21 June 2015 to discuss urgent international issues such as the Ukraine crisis, ISIL and the future of the EU and NATO.
“The unfolding crisis in Ukraine has revived debates on basic values and on the character of the international system, as well as on the fundamental principles of sovereignty and international law,” stated Robert Vass, founder of the GLOBSEC Forum and executive vice- president of the Central European Strategy Council. This year, with the escalated situation, Europe has even greater challenges to address. GLOBSEC, one of the world’s largest security conferences, offers a platform for shaping international responses to these challenges.
At the beginning of the 21st century, security policies were shaped mostly in global centers of power such as Washington, Brussels, Munich or London. In only ten years, GLOBSEC has changed that. By hosting Central Europe’s leading foreign policy conference, Bratislava has became a major centre for discussing and advancing regional, EU and NATO policies.
“Within a decade, the team of the Slovak Atlantic Commission has created a sustainable and internationally recognised forum, putting Bratislava on the map of international diplomatic and policy shaping hubs and helping to move the region from the periphery to the centre of global debates,” said former Slovak foreign minister Pavol Demeš. With these accomplishments under its belt, GLOBSEC 2015 aspires to outperform its previous success.
”In the light of the Ukraine crisis, which is taking place on our borders, the tenth edition of GLOBSEC will be so far the largest and the most important gathering of transatlantic and global leaders that Bratislava has ever hosted,” said Robert Vass. Discussions will focus on a wide range of other topics, most prominently on Europe’s response to Russia’s actions and on countering the Islamic State, as these threats impact on the values, the institutions and the security of the transatlantic community.
GLOBSEC belongs to the top conferences of its kind in the world. In only ten years, GLOBSEC has hosted dozens of presidents, prime-ministers and hundreds of journalists, experts and decisionmakers, including NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, former United States Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff, today’s President of the European Council Donald Tusk, General (Ret.) John Allen, and former US National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski.
———————————————————————————————————————— The Central European Strategy Council is an independent non-governmental organisation whose mission is to strengthen the voice of Slovakia and Central Europe in European and global affairs. The organisation connects key Central European personalities and experts on foreign and security policy with their European and North American counterparts. The Council associates three organisations – the Slovak Atlantic Commission (SAC), the Central European Policy Institute (CEPI) and the Centre for European Affairs (CEA). The Slovak Atlantic Commission organises the GLOBSEC Bratislava Global Security Forum, one of Europe’s largest international conferences.