MISSILE DEFENCE, KOSOVO AND AFGHANISTAN TOP

NATO PARLIAMENTARIANSÂ’ AGENDA AT SPRING SESSION IN MADEIRA

Portugal will host the NATO Parliamentary AssemblyÂ’s Spring Session, bringing together in Madeira some 300 parliamentarians from North America and Europe, from 25-28 May 2007.

The Plenary sitting on Friday 25 will be addressed by NATO PA President, JosÃ© LELLO followed by Portuguese Minister of Foreign Affairs Luis AMADO. This session will also be addressed by NATO Secretary General Jaap DE HOOP SCHEFFER, the Prime Minister of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia*, Nikola GRUEVSK and, Ms. Nino BURJANADZE, the Speaker of the Parliament of Georgia,.

NATO PA's five committees (Political, Defence and Security, Science and Technology, Civil Dimension of Security, Economics and Security) will meet on Saturday 26 and Sunday 27 and be addressed by guest speakers.

The NATO PA Session will address the major issues on the AllianceÂ’s agenda, notably the recent debate about missile defence in Europe, following the negotiations on the deployment of US missile defence assets on the territory of Poland and the Czech Republic. Developments with regard to the status of Kosovo, currently under discussion in the UN Security Council, will also be debated - particularly in the Political Committee - with the participation of parliamentary delegations from the Balkans, including the Kosovo Assembly and the Parliament of Serbia.

Operations in Afghanistan also figure prominently on the SessionÂ’s agenda. Two delegations from the Afghan and the Pakistani parliaments respectively will participate for the first time in an Assembly Session. A specific session in the Civil Dimension of Security Committee will be devoted to the issue of counter-narcotics.

Other topics to be addressed in Committee meetings will include NATO-EU operational co-operation, relations with partner countries - including Russia and Ukraine - democratic governance in the Black Sea region; NATO transformation, defence budgets and burden-sharing; and global climate change.

For further information, please contact

e-mail: Press@nato-pa.int

NATO Parliamentary Assembly

Place du Petit Sablon 3, 1000 Brussels, Belgium

TÃ©l: (32) 2 513 28 65 | Fax: (32) 2 514 18 47 |

website: http:// www.nato-pa.int |

Background

The NATO Parliamentary Assembly, founded in 1955 with a Brussels-based secretariat,

brings together 248 national parliamentarians from the 26 NATO countries.

In addition, 15 associate delegations from Central and Eastern Europe, Ukraine and Russia;

4 Mediterranean Associate delegations: Morocco, Algeria, Jordan, Israel

and 7 Parliamentary Observer delegations participate in Assembly activities and meetings.

* Turkey recognises the Republic of Macedonia with its constitutional name