From February 3 to 5 Minister of Defence of Latvia Artis Pabriks will participate in 48th Munich Security Conference where high level defence and security experts from the whole world will talk about security issues.

The delegates will discuss new security challenges in European and Asian countries, as well as the influence of “Arab spring” on the security situation in the world. Leaders of Libya, Egypt, Syria and many other Arab nations will talk about new challenges which are of great significance to the international security policy. The situation in Syria and Iran will also be analyzed.

“We will speak about the future of the Euro-Atlantic security community against the background of the economic and power-political rise of Asia. A few weeks ago the U.S.A. had proclaimed their new military strategy which will in the future be focused more on the Asia-Pacific region while Europe will see a large-scale reduction of U.S. forces,” said the chairman of the Munich Security Conference, Ambassador Wolfgang Ischinger.

Also the overall impact of the debt and financial crises to the international security policy and the resulting challenges will be discussed. Here the chairman of the conference Mr Ischinger expects a caesura in the European defense policy by a consolidation of military resources in order to create new cost-efficient synergies.

The 48th Munich Security Conference has been placed under the overall motto: "Securing of peace in a year of great geo-political changes and insecurities". This question and further urgent issues of foreign and security policy will be discussed in Munich also this year by high-ranking decision makers of politics and economy from more than 70 nations.

Daina Ozoliņa
Senior Desk Officer of the Media Relations Section
Military Public Affairs Department
Ministry of Defence of the Republic of Latvia
Phone: (+371) 6 7335224
E-mail: daina.ozolina@mod.gov.lv