 Rhaid fawr, a gweithio'r cymdeithasol. Mae gweithio'r cymdeithasol. Rwy'n dechrau bod yn fawr, dwi'n gwneud am gweithio'r cyfnodol. Mae'r cyfnodol yn fawr, ac mae'r cyfnodol yn dda. Mae'r cyfnodol yn gweithio'r cyfnodol yn 4,5 miliwn, dwi'n llwyso'r cyfrifio'r cyfnodol. Ond rwy'n gweithio'r cyfnodol yn gweithio'r cyfnodol. Mae gennym nhw'n gweithio gyrdi am gweithio'r cyfnodol. Mae'n gwneud i'w gweithio'r cyfnodol a chymdeithasol, dwi'n gweithio'r cyfnodol buddwyd yn ddim eich gweithio'n gweithio'r cyfrifio'r cyfrifio. Rydw i ddim ond ar gyfnodol yn fawr, le fydd ychydigion i chi'n sgwrtio gy symud i ddim teimlo, dwi'n ddim gweithio ddim eich cwm... ei-i-e-i-e Ie nhw, mewn sefydling, y cydwyddiant sy'n golygu ar hyn sy'n cydwyddiant, gennym wath i ni'r gwahol, yn y gallu gweithio ei amddiannol yn ôl. Mae Lleidio Cymru, rhai twyd, byddai'r CV1-325. mae angen i'r ddiwyf yn sgolwch am fynd yn gwirio stickersau gwahanol bob â'r tyfyng y teimlo perthcied yn debyg. Rydyn ni'n cyfnodd yn fwy o'r cyrgylluniaidd maen nhw'n gweithio'r cyd-fawr, ond rwy'n gweithio gyd-fawr. Am ystod, Malur i'w amser yn ymddi'r cyfnod 2016. Felly, mae'r ddweud yng nghymru yw 5 yr ysgol yw erioedd eich Llywodraeth a Llywodraeth Yngrifennu yn y Cymru, ac mae'r llyfr yn cymryd o'r llyfr ymddiad yn yr llyfr ymddiad yw'r llyfr ymddiad a Llywodraeth Gweithgrifennu. Mae'n gweithio ar y dyfodol yng Nghymru, yng Nghymru, ar y Ffodol Rusiadau, sy'n gweithio ar y Ffodol Rusiadau. Felly, yng Nghymru, mae'n gweithio ar y ddweudio Cymru, sy'n gweithio ar yr unigol Carnagai a Ddarmond, sy'n gweithio ar y rôl i'r Ffodol Rusiadau. Mae'n gweithio ar yr unigol Carnagai a'r unigol Cynllunio, between 2006 and 2008, and from 1998 to 2000 as Deputy Under Secretary of Energy for Defence, Nuclear Non-Proliferation, and before that Assistant Secretary and Director for Non-Proliferation and National Security at the US Department of Energy. And prior to our work at the Department of Energy, Ambassador Goethe-Muller served for three years as Deputy Director of the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London. From 1993 to 1994, she served on the National Security Staff as Director for Russia, and she has taught on Soviet military policy and Russian security at Georgetown University. As I say, that is a summary. There is more, but I believe. So, as you can hear from the experience that Ambassador Goethe-Muller, we're very, we're very grateful that she's coming to speak to us today to give us a keynote address which will examine the role of women, peace and security. She will discuss NATO's integrative approach to promoting gender equality with particular reference to its policy on women, peace and security. And this policy provides the foundation for work on gender equality across the Alliance and is framed around three guiding principles, inclusiveness, integration and integrity. And this, as I think anybody here will be aware, Resolution 1325 is used around the world as a policy tool to implement gender sensitive conflict related topics. It's also used as an organising framework for actors outside the UN, such as NGOs and researchers, in a way that I think could be said that no other Security Council resolution has been used. It was also the first formal and legal document that required parties to a conflict to prevent violation of women's rights, to support women's participation in peace negotiations and post-conflict reconstruction, and to protect women from gender-based violence. So it's been a seminal moment in the UN and across wider institutions than the UN. Ambassador Goethe-Muller also comes to us from where NATO has also changed over the years from out of area to working in conflict prevention. There's also been a significant change as we were discussing in cooperation with the EU where we have up to, as you said, 74 different areas of cooperation with the EU, which is a huge change from when there was a relative standoff a number of years ago between the two organisations, the cooperation is now outstanding and very profitable. And last but not least, just to mention, the third Irish action plan on women's peace and security was launched by the Department of Foreign Affairs just last month. And I think we feel proud of our record in this regard. We're looking forward to working with the new action plan. There's a new dimension on taking advantage of the experience of women in the conflict in Northern Ireland, and we will move forward on that in cooperation, of course with NATO. Laura's yours. Thank you very much Marie. It's wonderful to be here and to have this opportunity. We have indeed been planning this for a long time, and so I'm glad it came to fruition and on such a beautiful day to be honest. I've said to myself, riding around town this morning, I want to move to Dublin. So it's like this in the middle of January too, right? Anyway, thank you. Thank you for the introduction. Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you all today. I'm really delighted to be in Ireland, the island known for saints and scholars. Ireland is a very important partner of NATO. This year we are celebrating 20 years of Ireland in the partnership for peace, the first of many NATO cooperation programs with partner countries. We cooperate in a variety of areas, including peacekeeping operations, where Ireland is an international leader. We also work together encountering improvised explosive devices, where Ireland has valuable experience to share, and sadly among our partners around the world work on dealing with improvised explosive devices and unexploded ordinance overall, this has become a global issue, and so Ireland's experience is of great value not only to NATO, but to other partners and colleagues around the world. We also share the same values, and we certainly share a strong commitment to the women's peace and security agenda, an issue that is dear to my heart. Your country is a global champion on WPS. I'd like to congratulate you for launching your third national action plan on women's peace and security in June of this year in Cork. To quote from the excellent review of your second national action plan, Ireland is interested in WPS because we know from lessons learned from the Northern Ireland peace process that in conflict resolution and building lasting peace, women's contribution is vital. Let me also mention the important role Ireland plays in support of the WPS agenda globally. You hosted two meetings of the regional acceleration for resolution 1325 known colloquially as RAR. This platform created in 2016 aims to facilitate the exchange of best practices and lessons learned in implementing the WPS agenda. It does so by working among the participating organizations, the UN, the EU, the OSCE, the African Union, and last but not least, NATO. Ireland plays a key role in supporting NATO's WPS agenda, not least by offering us Lieutenant Colonel Mary Carroll who is with us today, and I'm delighted that you are with us today. I'm really glad you could join us. She is a serving officer in the Irish Defence Forces. She currently works as an advisor in the Office of the Secretary General, Special Representative for Women, Peace, and Security at NATO's headquarters in Brussels. Mary was the first Irish woman to command a UN peacekeeping mission on the Golan Heights in 2016. She brings remarkable experience and expertise to the team and to NATO more broadly. We also were honored to have the Chief of Staff of your Defence Forces Vice-Admiral Mark Mellott at the NATO headquarters recently, and he is with us again today. Thank you, sir, for being present. We really appreciate it. He explained at headquarters, this was back in June, that taking the WPS agenda seriously is crucial because greater gender balance and incorporating gender perspectives drive capability. We need this capability for peacemaking, peacekeeping, stabilization, and institutionalization of the norms and principles associated with civil society. This makes sense to me, believe me, and it is a view we share among the NATO community. Implementing the UN's Security Council resolutions on women, peace and security has become a vital part of NATO's work. I'm proud of the alliance's record. We've had a policy on women, peace and security in place since 2007. NATO leaders endorsed an updated version of the policy when they gathered just over a year ago at the NATO summit in Brussels. It's based around three eyes, integration, inclusiveness and integrity. I'm going to break from my prepared remarks here for a second to say 2007, yes, we put a WPS policy in place, but I have to say the refresher of that policy in 2017 is driving us harder and faster than ever before because we are focused now on implementation and on monitoring that implementation. Here, too, Ireland has a lot to offer because you have been focused on implementation and making sure that that implementation is monitored. We do look forward to learning from you in this process as well. Let me turn to the three eyes around which our policy is based. Mary already mentioned them, integration, inclusiveness and integrity. First, integration. This is about integrating gender equality as a core part of all NATO policies, programs and projects. Here, NATO is strengthening our cooperation with civil society on a range of issues to advance the WPS agenda most effectively. A panel of civil society advisors makes recommendations to NATO on how we can better integrate gender perspectives into everything we do, recognizing that what we do affects both men and women. I'll break again from my prepared remarks to say this is the only civil society advisors organization we have at NATO. I'm very proud of it. We have people from across, really, the Euro-Atlantic area and particularly those from the western Balkans have been very helpful in pushing us ahead in our understanding of these issues. To those of you in the audience representing civil society, you can hear I'm enthusiastic about civil society. I want to say that your work makes an incredible difference in the lives of ordinary people around the world. It is not an easy job, but the results are worth the effort. In the words of Ireland's former president, Mary McAllies, it is absolutely no accident that the peace and reconciliation and indeed economic progress that eluded Ireland generation after generation for hundreds of years has at last come to pass in an Ireland where the talents of women are now flooding every aspect of life as never before. Long may this continue and very well said. Second eye is inclusiveness. The representation of women across NATO and in national forces is vital to enhancing our effectiveness in the field particularly. We want to increase the participation of women in all tasks and at all levels. We've made real progress in this area and I will say in NATO it's been very important. 85% of NATO countries have all positions in their armed forces open to women today. Seven allied nations currently have female defense ministers. Eight women currently serve as ambassadors to NATO's North Atlantic Council. Overall we are seeing greater numbers of women in leadership positions including in our military structures. We will soon in November have a woman commanding the NATO mission in Iraq, General Jenny Kerrigan from Canada and may I say Canada's among the allies been a real leader on this issue. They will have three general officers in command positions at NATO come this fall including not only Jenny Kerrigan in Iraq but also the commander of our standing naval group, SNMG2 will be a naval admiral and the head of the NATO defense college in Rome is also a Canadian general so it's very very notable that Canada is a real leader and a partner with us also on these important issues. This is all good progress but it is only a beginning and we must go further. More women on operational duty enhances our effectiveness. More diverse teams perform better and if you want to build the effective forces to face up to future challenges ignoring 50% of your talent is a really bad idea and I feel this very strongly. I think countries who do not pull forth the talent from all of their all of their population is a country that is disadvantaged and I think the development numbers we were we were talking to the chief this morning about this their development numbers and numbers related to conflict show that. I know the irish defense forces successfully embeds WPS within its training and international missions. It is one of the very few militaries in the world to have its own exclusive action plan with many innovative ideas and actions for enhancing gender equality and diversity. I understand your military personnel significantly contributed to the development of your third national action plan. I think this is an excellent example for all of us. The third eye is integrity. It is said that integrity is doing the right thing even when no one is looking. In 2019 the world continues to mistreat at least half of humanity. Women and girls are often horrendously treated especially at times of conflict when rape and violence disproportionately affect women and girls. Treating everyone as equals with respect and basic human dignity should never be compromised even in the midst of war. NATO has a special responsibility to make sure that its own troops always observe the very highest standards of behavior whatever the circumstances. That is why we are in the process of developing the first ever NATO policy to prevent and respond to sexual exploitation and abuse. It is a big focus for us right now. We're working hard to drive forward on the SEA policy so that this too can be endorsed at the level of our leaders when they come together in London at the end of the year in December. So SEA is next on our agenda always on our agenda but in terms of getting the policy in place we will work hard to get it endorsed at the leaders level by December this year. So integration inclusiveness and integrity these are the watch words as we move forward with our agenda to make gender equality an everyday reality for women and girls everywhere. For NATO realizing true gender equality at every level merits our constant attention and effort. We are heading in the right direction I think. We will continue to work closely with other international organizations and with partner countries importantly Ireland to further advance the women peace and security agenda. We benefit from your active engagement with the alliance on this front so from me a big thank you once again. We thank you all for your leadership on WPS and we look forward to working with you as we develop this agenda going forward. So thank you very much for your attention I'm going to sit down now and take your questions from the table but I look forward to our discussion. Thank you very very much. Thank you very much Ambassador Gautamuller. As the ambassador said she is willing to take questions and these can be on the record perhaps the questioners could identify themselves and as they as they put the questions. Ronan and Valerie. Thank you. First of all I must acknowledge that the chairperson said that I can understand why you would call UN resolution 1325 a a seminal moment in the history of the UN as I've studied 1325 but I would put it to you and I really welcome the opportunity to put it to someone so senior in NATO as well that Syria uniquely illustrates that 1325 well it certainly has generated not a fanfare in the breach it might as well not exist and I put it to you that really if we are to see respect for women and in Syria we see women raped we see women slaughtered in fact when I was making the recent film I'll do another one now on Syria I was quite shocked to discover that it's safer for women at home with children or sorry it's safer on the front line than in their own home is the way in which for example barrel bombs were deployed in Syria but that's just one example it has done nothing to advance security and that really we have to be looking at a much more fundamental new paradigm that places greater emphasis on human rights because obviously women can only play their role in peacekeeping can only play their role in a security situation where they are protected and this is where the notion of human security comes in and this as you uniquely would be aware of what that means in practice that I would put it to you that really until we prioritize that we're wasting our time talking about any impact 1325 can have in these terrible situations you also alluded to thank you ambassador I think Valerie will probably talk about Syria as well yeah it's just to add to that thank you very much thank you ambassador it was just to ask you as well specifically ambassador about the UN board of inquiry that NATO has asked mr Guterres Antonio Guterres the UN secretary general to name the actual to do an investigation into the bombing of hospitals specifically in Syria and NATO has requested this is one of the groups who has requested Antonio Guterres but it's it's um even though it has requested this NATO doesn't seem to provide the tracking reports because as mr bronc of the Russi Royal United Services Institute has indicated NATO would be well aware of the Russian planes taking off and where they are exactly and they have asked the Syria group in the UK have provided a Syria briefing for the UK parliament and they have asked specifically that NATO would not withhold the tracking information from the inquiry because the inquiry it was withheld under Obama in three years ago today September at this time in September three years ago today a UN assisted aid convoy was bombed for four hours and at that time the information tracking information was withheld even though a US defense commander did speak out straight after the killing to the washington post and said clearly russia had been involved with any backtrack thank you very much thank you yes let me take these on first of all i want to say straight out that NATO per se is not involved in Syria and of course we follow closely developments there because we are concerned we have a NATO ally adjacent a neighbor of Syria and that is Turkey and there are NATO allies who are involved in Turkey I'm sorry in Syria Turkey is among them the United States is another so we pay attention to what is occurring there I would say as a as a general matter that we are very concerned about the the overall threats to human rights that occur in these terrible conflicts in these conflict zones because at the at the heart of what NATO is about it is these international values embedded in the Washington treaty which every NATO ally signs up to when they become NATO members are the values that are incorporated into the UN Charter so it is truly part of of our DNA to be concerned thank you very much I think it's nearly 20 years since 1325 was negotiated progress has been very slow when you could say and it's nice to hear you saying good things about Ireland but would you say that that was equally true of the majority of UN member states it's a time to move beyond 1325 the title is the resilience of 1325 has it been resilient or is it a case of the those who who are most active in its negotiation having a strong commitment but the rest just floating away those experience where we have a broad variety of NATO members we have NATO members who have been there since NATO was created after world war two to begin to take on the threats that emerged after the iron curtain came down and so NATO began with its original members in 1949 and then we have member states who are members of the Warsaw Pact and came into NATO after the wall came down in 1989 so we have a broad spectrum of NATO members what I can tell you is that 1325 has enabled us to get everybody on the same page at least in acknowledging the issues and understanding the issues and being willing to sign up to an action plan being willing to sign up to certain norms and certain values and that I think in itself is important because the next step then has and I tried to indicate in my remarks the next step has to be to put in place not only the policy that's very pretty thank you very much but if the policy is not being implemented what good is it so the next phase which we are embarked on now is with an implementation plan in place to really work hard on implementation and monitor that implementation to ensure again across the broad spectrum of allies we are getting results that's going to be difficult because again broad range of allies different points of view different cultures different histories it's going to be difficult but I think it's a I think it's a long slog frankly and again I would not criticize 1325 because it has not produced at this point in its history perfect exalt results but I do think it's been a very valuable tool because I can see that in NATO thank you next is come and yes I know we have three or four more questions so we'll get we'll get around come thank you very much deputy secretary general for a very insightful talk um you said something earlier and it struck a chord to me just in terms of NATO and UN approaches to the whole area of women peace and security um in my experience I've been involved in training and instructing personnel both NATO personnel and UN personnel where this area has has encroached has has uh become part of we'll say tactics techniques and procedures at the at that level one of the things I found was within NATO a nearly all NATO troop contributing nations have some sort of training that percolates down to the to tune commander and and below that's not the case with the UN sometimes it gets stuck at brigade level and doesn't go any further and certainly doesn't become an apparent thing to the troops at the operational level and secondly even when it does the big difference I found between NATO and UN policy on this NATO tended to instruct troops about looking at women who are caught up in conflict not just as victims but as potential key interlocutors operational aids to getting into a community to be guides into a community that certainly wasn't the case within the UN I think that's a big loss and I just wonder what your thoughts are on that and how that could be dealt with appropriately yes I actually have been very pleased that several of our interlocutors here in Dublin have made that point and I've been pleased to hear it frankly and my colleague James Mackie has reminded me frankly that back when we did have a combat mission in in Afghanistan that ended in 2014 ISAF we did have women working women you know military working in the various units who were going out to the field and they became very important as trusted interlocutors with the local Afghan population particularly the women and therefore were helping to have a better understanding of what was going on on the ground so they became very valuable in an operational sense so I do think that it's important to bear in mind that experience I think has informed NATO's reflecting on it just in the last 24 hours that experience has informed NATO's attitudes and frankly I have also just become aware I think of the degree to which there is a differential there with other organizations such as the UN I will say that in the last couple of years we've developed very good working relationships not only with the European Union which has blossomed but also with the United Nations with much more interaction specifically on 1325 these are flagship areas of cooperation not only with the EU but also with the UN so that I hope we can translate some of the experience we have had in the last decade in a way that will be meaningful to the peacekeeping organizations in those two institutions and that we perhaps can help to inform them in a way that will get it down below that level to be more effective on the ground and certainly once again we will be very much valuing the experience of Ireland and helping to do that in other settings I know you obviously work with the UN as well as with the EU also so perhaps we can make some common cause in that regard I hope we can as the country with the longest experience of peacekeeping in the whole of the UN on Birken we have another question here and then we'll let the back and then host hi thank you very much thank you for an interesting talk Katrina Dyed from Dublin City University I wanted to perhaps take a slightly more positive view on 1325 because you mentioned that it's one of many instruments but as the chair mentioned it's perhaps unique among UN resolutions and having generated so much momentum and those of us who might look at other resolutions around IHL or human rights and humanitarian crises might despair at how they have been left on the shelf in a way that for its faults or its shortcomings 1325 has not and I wondered if from an organizational perspective if you could speak to what you see as the key features or the key aspects of 1325 or mobilisation around 1325 that have contributed to that momentum that is an excellent question and I think it's just stubborn energy from some key actors in NATO I will name for one your ambassador to the EU and representative to NATO Ambassador Helen Nolan who's here with us today partners push NATO on this matter we also have a number I mentioned the the fact that a third of our ambassadors at NATO now are women but it's not only the women around the North Atlantic Council table who push this but also a number of a number of our ambassadors the ambassador of Norway for example Norway has been a very staunch supporter of advancing 1325 so it's a matter of national commitment I think sometimes it's a matter of personal commitment among our allied ambassadors but mostly that personal commitment is linked back to a strong national commitment and I could name also the Netherlands the UK for example very strong pushes from several directions in NATO so it's a kind of cussed cussedness a kind of stubbornness to push the issue forward that I think has been very very good for NATO per se I can only speak for for the experience of my institution frankly when I arrived in 2016 three years ago the issue was still a bit adrift we had our nice action plan from 2007 but it wasn't being implemented and we've been joking the last two days as I've been here that it was always at the bottom of the list you'd go through your talking points for the ministerial and no support for WPS 1325 was always at the bottom of the list I've been gratified to see as these three years have gone on that it's becoming more you know up the list of priorities to be pursued and associated with operational effectiveness and that's the key it has to have for NATO is a defensive alliance it has to have some sense of a utility to our missions and operations and so I think that recognition it's been slow and coming but but is starting to develop more and that's an important factor as well thank you yes and you have the microphones coming in thank you my name is Anastacia Crickty I'm an activist one-time academic but I was also a member of the steering group for the last women's peace and security action plan Irish action plan and thank you for your address I think it's been very useful I particularly like your integration and inclusiveness and integrity framework and I'm building a little bit on the question with regard to 1325 affairs gone and also building on all the time and earlier and emancipation of the human rights frame I wonder would you agree that perhaps an intersectional approach rather than trying to change 1325 but by now globally we have the instruments that we need to create the conditions for full integration of women's peace and security mechanisms and two things I would just like to suggest you one is an intersectional approach with the human rights treaty quality framework on UN in particular what other regions other regional institutions as well to think of it for example unconscious Liberia's country I'm quite familiar with unconscious of the extent to which perhaps a discrimination against minority women there can create a particular role and how they were able to engage in peace and security mechanisms there and how perhaps other forms of discrimination against women which are addressed in that framework and in regional framework support of the African Union perhaps and and then on the other side as well I really liked your thought about monitoring implementation with monitoring it seems to me though that perhaps another turn there needs to be about not just output but also monitoring for impact and doing it within a way that's gender sensitive and focuses on the impact for women at all stages in the process thank you yes that's a very good point you know I'm very much a pragmatist in my approach to things and how I think about this is that we are we are building also on accumulated experience the Northern Ireland peace process is one area of accumulated experience where the role of women was extraordinarily important I had the good fortune to sit down with and have dinner with a number of women last evening who had been involved in different aspects of the peace process and it came home to me how much work has been done here I knew that for a fact but just understanding the depth and breadth of the work that had and the experience accumulated here in the process of coming coming to to peace that's and then the continuing issues that that must be tackled so it's not like it's a a quiescent issue it's an active issue that that has to have constant attention so that's a good example and then you know the different peace processes that have been more or less successful I had the good fortune this week to meet with the woman who was the chief negotiator in the Philippines peace process with the Islamic group there and her very strong commitment to the notion that women negotiators play a special role because they can they can diffuse a situation at a negotiating table where a man might decide he has to get up and walk out they'll perhaps be a bit more patient or figure out a way to to talk to the next stage you know and to me all of that accumulated experience I could mention Colombia again I could mention what went on in Sri Lanka years ago these more or less successful peace processes going forward have presented us with enough practical examples that that's where I see we we need to examine them and I know many people in the academic community here in Ireland are doing so we have to examine them and think about what the lessons learned are and try to build build out from there so I think perhaps your your thought about approaches which would be in the realm of high policy perhaps in the UN setting could be very valuable as well I can't comment on that but I I do see the value of of building out from the pragmatic progress that has been made in the last two decades thank you Horst and I'm with you Horst for my NATO officer my name is Horst Siedlach I'm a German citizen and I spent 12 years in your own internet quarters and military and severe diplomatic positions very good to meet you I have one observation and two passions okay observation of the Indian environment you got a civilian post to the international staff at that time already woodmen boards were encouraged to the women in business and they had to compete with young female academics and people of us they were only managed to get away from the stereotype at the time gray the tired male because I didn't have too much gray hairs at that time but my question is more related to your own professional background beyond of your achievements in promoting the case of him the first question is INF in the Netherlands nuclear treaty which has been answered now from US and Russia what is NATO going to do to challenge the Russian position without embarking in another arms place which would have a lot of problems the second question looking to the future what what what country might be the next they remember Georgia or Finland surprises well that second one is easy to answer because we know that Georgia is actually an aspiring country that was embraced at the Bucharest summit meeting now over a decade ago and it still remains on that list because the Georgians have clearly expressed a desire to join NATO NATO has accepted that fact embrace that fact Georgia has a distance to go still we are in fact we're just about to take a trip to Georgia in a couple weeks I'm leading the North Atlantic Council in the first few days of October to Georgia to to review with them their progress so far but they've still got some work to do on reform and frankly we at NATO are a little bit concerned about some of the backsliding on reform watching what's been happening with a judiciary there and so forth so we'll be very keen to talk with the Georgian leadership about how they see the reform prognosis at the moment so Georgia is already an aspiring it's it's expressed its desire to join NATO and NATO allies are ready to work with it on that aspiration Finland has not Finland has long embraced its neutrality Finland and again it's a matter also for each each government to consider what public opinion is public opinion in Finland does not stand up for NATO membership so we feel quite comfortable with that we have a number of partners including Ireland who are neutral they don't ever want to join NATO but we work very closely with them nevertheless so that question is easy to answer actually I think the INF treaty question is rather easy to answer as well if if you're not familiar with this issue the intermediate range nuclear forces treaty has been in existence since the late 1980s it banned all nuclear and conventional intermediate range ground launched systems in Europe those or globally rather those are missiles in the range from 500 kilometers to 5500 kilometers so it's quite a wide range of missiles the Russians developed a new missile called in NATO parlance the SSC8 and they began deploying it some years ago I worked hard as a US diplomat before I took the job at NATO to try to get them to back away from that program to eliminate the missiles and remain compliant with the INF treaty the trump administration did the same they refused to come back into compliance with the treaty so a treaty that's been hollowed out because one side is not implementing it anymore does not serve anybody's security so that is why NATO supported the United States when in august it decided to leave the INF treaty now what are we going to do next as always in the context of deterrence and defense but also dialogue NATO is working on a dual track first of all we do have a package of options that we are looking at that are defensive in nature they are in line with international law and they are certainly I think very judicious in our approach first of all looking at better integrated air and missile defense looking at resilience how we ensure you know despite facing this this new threat from Russia that that our forces will be resilient in spite of it better intelligence and warning more training and exercises so we understand how to handle the threat as it is looking at the resilience of also NATO's dual capable aircraft mission which is our nuclear mission but one thing I want to stress and this is an important message for this audience as well NATO has no intention of deploying new ground launched intermediate range nuclear missiles in Europe so this is not a replay of the dual track decision from from 1987 it's or it was made earlier and then it was brought to its close by the 1987 entry into force of INF that debate in the late 70s into the 1980s about you know the deployment of Soviet missiles at that time the SS 20 and then NATO deployed the so-called Pershing to and and Glickum's the ground launch cruise missiles to respond to that was a huge debate inside NATO it proved to be effective in terms of leveraging the Soviets to the negotiating table but we're not seeing a replay of that now we have no intention of deploying new nuclear missiles in Europe period and so I think we have to be judicious about our response and we also have to work the other side of the ledger the arms control side of the ledger and so we are looking for ways to also bring the Russians to the negotiating table but possibly others as well the administration in Washington has taken note that the Chinese are deploying a large number of such missiles out in Asia can we look at ways to bring them and other countries who deploy such missiles in South Asia the Indians and Pakistanis DPRK well we're dealing with them in another setting Iran clearly has some very effective missiles now so are there ways to work this issue more broadly as well but but NATO is contributing to that that strand of work as well and we'll continue to do so we will always be committed to the dialogue track as well as to deterrence and defense thank you very much must I will leave the last question to the chief of defense yeah mark myles i'm the chief of defense just to reinforce how important 1325 is to us in terms of defense forces shaping in terms of how we develop as an organization you know is clear to us that improving gender balance institutionalizing a gender perspective and empowerment of women is critical to our capability and in fact right now it's a risk issue for us because we're not making the progress we'd like and we look in terms of where we deliver services internationally wherever the gender gap is greatest interstate and interstate conflict is greatest and that's why you know when we send our troops abroad we ensure that the train is right that the gender advisers are there and we go in with that perspective but I suppose one mission that we did spend quite a long time 15 years ago 15 years in was in Afghanistan and as I look now towards the peace and reconciliation is there I worry because when I look at the gender gap indices and I look where Afghanistan is and I know there is been some progress but still it is not reflecting very well and I would be concerned that perhaps a change in regime and a change in institutions would perhaps cause a slippage in terms of rather than progressing on that gender gap index it actually would begin to widen again and I wonder would you have any comments on that? This is a question that has been widely discussed around the North Atlantic Council table all of the allies are concerned that whatever peace and reconciliation process emerges in Afghanistan that the primary objective must be to sustain the constitutional gains of the last of the last two decades and that means ensuring also that women and girls can be educated ensuring that women and girls their rights are respected ensuring that we don't fall into the morass that we experienced again when everything fell apart two decades ago so I think for the NATO allies this issue will be front and center as we I hope are able to move into a peace and reconciliation process in in Afghanistan so we will really want to look again at not only practical ways to preserve those gains but also recognizing that it is against the backdrop of profound pressures to perhaps move backwards and and I think we're all going to have to bear that in mind. Thank you very much to all the questioners and to the chief of the peninsula and particularly to you for your generosity not only in your remarks but in answering the many and varied questions we have. I think you've left us with the feeling that there is a strong commitment in NATO to implementing the 1325 not just talking about it it is moving up the agenda. I think probably what is important in terms of seeing practical results on the ground is is gender advisers in military missions. I think we have noted that where this has been the case in missions we've been involved and there is somebody who is at the front line keeping an eye on it and it's not just a commitment that isn't isn't backed up. I think in answer to your second last question to Horst you really opened a huge other debate in terms of the challenges that are in the world and that could take us for many more hours but it does leave us with the consciousness that the insecurity that is involved but also the challenge that as you said 50% of the world's population needs to be brought in to defend the values that NATO, EU and the UN hold very closely. So thank you so much for your participation. We wish you a very well for the future and I really appreciate your coming. Must be a very busy time for you so thank you again.