U.S.- Poland Strategic Dialogue
From: "U.S. Department of State" Date: Wed, 3 Nov 2010 12:50:09 -0500 (CDT)
Subject: Europe and Eurasia: U.S.- Poland Strategic Dialogue
Europe and Eurasia: U.S.- Poland Strategic Dialogue
Wed, 03 Nov 2010 12:17:28 -0500
U.S.- Poland Strategic Dialogue
Philip H. Gordon
Assistant Secretary, Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs
Press Conference at Ministry of Foreign Affairs Palace
Warsaw, Poland
October 28, 2010
ASSISTANT SECRETARY GORDON: Thank you very much, Mr. Minister. It’s a real pleasure to be back in Warsaw. We are on the heels of several hours of very constructive discussions we had today as part of the U.S.–Poland Strategic Dialogue. It follows further discussions held yesterday in the High Level Defense Group, and the two sets of meetings together really reflect the depth of the dialogue our two countries have on a very wide range of issues.
Today we discussed many of those issues. We have a lot of interests in common. We discussed the NATO summit in Lisbon that’s coming up, and I think it is accurate to say that on that issue, as on so many other issues we discussed, there’s a commonality of views between the United States and Poland. We agreed on the basic framework for the new Strategic Concept that we hope allies will agree upon in Lisbon. It will provide a strong reiteration of our commitment to Article 5 and also the allies’ collective view that there are new security threats that we need to be in a position to deal with.
And it will also reflect our commitment to succeed in Afghanistan, and we want to say right here how grateful we are for Poland’s support for, contribution to, and participation in the mission in Afghanistan, which we know is very difficult and requires resources and commitment. It’s critically important to the United States to have strong allies like Poland doing such a great job in our common mission there.
Another issue which we discussed and agreed would be a subject in Lisbon is missile defense. The United States looks forward to allies coming together to support a missile defense mission for the NATO alliance, and Poland, of course, is prepared to be a major contributor to that common goal. We are very grateful for that as well.
In addition to the NATO issues, we discussed a number of regional security and political questions, including our relationships with Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus. I was just in Russia earlier this week and of course the Russian Foreign Minister is here in Warsaw today, so we compared notes on our respective relationships with Russia, and I believe we have a lot in common on that question as well.
As mentioned, we discussed other regional issues, including energy security, and the United States shares with Poland a commitment to energy diversity. And we are working very closely together on the U.S. Global Shale Gas Initiative, as well as other energy issues.
On the whole, I think you can see we have a long list of things that we can and did talk about, and it’s really no exaggeration to say that on that whole menu of items, the United States and Poland are very close partners. Thank you very much.
Source: US Department of State, http://www.state.gov/p/eur/rls/rm/2010/150364.htm