 Okay, ladies and gentlemen, we are running a bit late and we have a large panel this afternoon, so please take your seats as soon as possible. My name is Andy Kutchins. I'm the director of the Russia Eurasia program here at CSIS, and it's a distinct pleasure to have an honor to chair this panel. I must apologize in advance, though, and that I'm going to have to leave early myself, but don't think that I am taking my responsibility lightly. I have a very compelling reason. I have to get my 12-year-old daughter to basketball practice. She and her sixth-grade colleagues are playing for a region-wide multi-county championship in a seventh-grade league on Sunday, and I certainly don't want to be the cause of diminishing their chances for victory. This is a very interesting gathering, and I've been looking forward to it. In the past couple of years, I've learned a lot about the OSCE through my involvement in the project here at CSIS on the Kazakh chairmanship that was led by Janusz Bogalski in the New Democracies project, and then I had the opportunity to go to Vienna in December, just after the Astana meeting, and get a full readout from the various departments of the OSCE about Astana. I think there was a feeling at the OSCE that the message coming out of the Astana meeting didn't accentuate as successful as it was, and that was certainly my feeling. I think there were a lot of very distinguishing aspects to the Kazakh chair of the OSCE, and probably the one that I was most personally pleased to see is the accent being placed on a broader, more attention to security in Eurasia, including Afghanistan. They haven't taken me up on my proposal yet to rename the organization for security and cooperation in Europe and Eurasia, but all in good time. I was especially looking forward to this meeting, because I'm a perfect example of what Bulent was talking about, ignorance in Washington about SICA. In fact, until about an hour ago, I would have pronounced the acronym KICA. Already this has been a very, very successful endeavor for me. We have a distinguished and diverse panel as appropriate for such diverse organizations, both in membership as well as their substantive agenda of tasks and challenges. So let's move over. Let me introduce very quickly the members of our panel and then get to the panel discussion. To my, let me slip in order here, Ambassador General Aldemar is the SICA Executive Director. Welcome here to Washington. And to his left is Alexander Pavliuk. Alexander, good to see you again, the Head of External Cooperation at the OSCE Secretariat. And to his left is Ali Jalali, Distinguished Professor at the NISA Center here in Washington, former Minister of Interior to Afghanistan. And then to his left is Jarrett Blank, who is a Senior Advisor at the Office of the Special Representative for Afghanistan-Pakistan. And finally to Jarrett's left is James Callahan, who is a Program Analyst at the Bureau of International Law Enforcement and Narcotics Affairs, also at the State Department. So with no further ado, let me turn the floor over to Ambassador Aldemar. Aldemar, thank you, Mr. Chairman. First of all, I would like to join the others in expressing my gratitude to CSIS for organizing such a timely and important meeting. And I also thank them for giving me the opportunity of addressing this audence, which I believe will be very useful at the end of the day for our cooperation with SICA. In my statement today, I would like first to develop a bit lengthy on SICA for those who doesn't have more idea about our organization. The principles, including the security concept of SICA, I think should be mentioned a bit lengthy in this meeting. And secondly, I would also mention the new threats and challenges facing the SICA region and how can we deal to solve these issues with the cooperation of the OECE and the relevant organizations. I think SICA is a multilateral forum for enhancing cooperation towards promoting peace, security and stability in Asia through dialogue, interaction and confidence-building measures among the member states. I think these are the key elements of SICA. It was convened at the initiative taken in October 1999 by President Nur-Sultan Nazarbayev of the Republic of Kazakhstan. Actually, President Nazarbayev is the godfather of our organization. I think we should also look at the time when this announcement was made by President Nur-Sultan Nazarbayev. It was a time when profound changes were taking place in the world after the disappearance of the so-called bipolar world. The moving spirit behind this initiative was to restart the previously abortive efforts to create an effective and universal body to safeguard security in Asia and move towards a unified Asian structure for collective security. Conveining of SICA and the support it received from the international community was the recreational effect that there is a close link between peace, security, and stability in Asia and the rest of the world. We have two important documents in SICA, a declaration on the principles guiding relations between the SICA member states of 1999 and the Almaty Act of 2002. These are the founding documents of SICA and these documents set the basic framework for the relations between the member states, the objectives of the conference, and its functioning. We have 24 members from almost all parts of Asia, including Central Asia, South Asia, and also in the Middle East. So I think it is a unique organization getting together all these important parts of Asia. We are all aware of the fundamental premise that the security is invisible in our understanding in SICA. In this context, basic documents of SICA specifically mention that no state will strengthen its security at the expense of the security of other states and that security of every member state is inseparable linked to the other. This is a very important concept of invisibility in the security area for SICA. Another important characteristic of security in our minds is to be comprehensive security. Closely linked to the concept of comprehensive nature of security in the contemporary world, security no longer emanates primarily from military superiority or quality of weapons system. The concepts of indivisible and comprehensive security are duly recognized in Almaty Act and following the spirit of Almaty Act, the catalogue of SICA confidence building measures lays down five broad areas of cooperation among the member states. These are military political dimension, fight against new challenges and threats, economic dimension, the environment and human dimension. Asia continues to face numerous security challenges which threaten not only the recent economic gains but also the peace and stability in the continent. While Europe, in spite of the so-called Cold War, enjoyed an era of relative peace in the post-Second World War, Asia witnessed some of the bloodiest conflicts during this period. It's an extremely diverse region having some of the largest and the smallest countries with significantly different levels of development and aspirations. There are also cultural, ethnic, religious and historical differences to overcome in our region. At the beginning of the second decade of the new millennium, SICA region continues to face multiple flash points with significant conflict potentials including border disputes that have been in existence for historical and other reasons which have sometimes even led to confrontations and wars. In all of these flash points could spark conflagration that could undermine the peace and prosperity of the region. Recent political developments in the SICA region also act as a pointer to the new challenges faced by the region. I don't need to remind you that there is a close link between peace, security and stability in Asia and in the rest of the world. So as we come to the basic documents of SICA under these circumstances in our region, they provide for mechanism to face these challenges. In the guiding principles, member states in Teralia reaffirmed their commitment to achieve full, just and lasting relations of peace, openness, mutual trust, security, stability and cooperation in Asia. They aim at eliminating tensions and seeking peaceful settlement of disputes. So in Almaty Act, member states agreed to implement confidence building measures which I mentioned earlier. Asia now faces a number of non-traditional security challenges, commonly known as new threats and challenges. In this context, enemies are not states and their armies. We are faced with an unseen but more dangerous enemy. While globalization has brought unprecedented benefits to the form of rapid economic, technological and social changes, these changes have also spawned the much more sinister by product of new security challenges. Some of the major non-traditional challenges faced by Asia today are terrorism, production and trafficking of illicit drugs, transnational crime, environmental degradation, spread of infectious diseases and trafficking in human beings and small arms. These are, of course, unconventional threats and challenges which we have never faced before. Moreover, globalization has also been blamed for increasing economic and social inequities and consequent tension in certain parts of Asia. While poverty itself cannot be identified as a security challenge, it has certainly contributed to the rise of some of the new threats and challenges. Most of these challenges have transnational linkages aided by the ease of communications and transportation. Increasingly wired and connected world has enabled collaboration not only among the companies and communities, but unfortunately also among the terrorists and criminal groups. Today, international terrorism has become one of the most serious threats to global peace and security, as well as a scourge of all democratic governments and the Sika region has suffered most on the account of terrorism. Mr. Chairman, in the Sika region, international terrorism has also closed links with illicit drug production and trafficking as well as transnational organized crime, money laundering and trafficking in small arms. Terrorist groups in Afghanistan and certain other countries are providing protection to cultivators, producers and smugglers of illicit drugs. In return, international drug mafia provides much-needed funds to the terrorist groups through money laundering which in terraria is used for the purchasing arms from the traffickers. We are therefore faced with the vicious circle of new challenges that need to be tackled simultaneously. Therefore, fight against new threats and challenges is a very important issue for the Sika member states. Sika, on its part, has taken a very strong stand against terrorism. In all Sika declarations, the member states have reaffirmed their determination to cooperate on bilateral as well as multilateral basis to combat terrorism. Sika, on the other hand, has not confined himself to merely making statements on the issue of terrorism. Sika also has in place an action plan for implementation of confidence building measures in this dimension. Of course, the Turkish chairmanship as a coordinator and Afghanistan as a co-coordinator also contributed to this process. Sika has also adopted a separate action plan for cooperation among member states in the area of illicit drug production and trafficking which is being coordinated by Iran and co-coordinated by Afghanistan. Some of the important features of the action plan is creating network for focal points in Sika member states, dealing with relevant subjects, organizing seminars and training programs, regular meetings of police chiefs, timely exchange of information and establishment of centers of excellence. The theme of the action plan has already commenced with the first Sika chiefs of police meeting held in Antalya in June last year. We are hopeful that implementation of confidence building measures among the Sika member states will go a long way to address the issue of international terrorism. Sika is also a member of the core group which coordinates economic assistance to Afghanistan. Sika is also aware of the necessity of preventing terrorism through countering ideologies that justify it. For this purpose, Sika is making efforts to develop inter-civilization and international dialogue and understanding by holding seminars and meetings on this subject. But of course, Sika can't do it alone. In an increasingly interconnected and interdependent world, regional security cannot be seen in isolation. Security environment in the region has an impact in the other regions. All peace and security can be ensured only if regional structures cooperate with each other. It is not possible for any single country or single regional grouping to meet the new challenges which are global in nature. What we need is collective and collaborative approach that would create objective conditions for understanding and resolution of complex problems faced by the global community. For identifying issues and finding practical solutions, it is imperative that there should be constructive dialogue and cooperation between different regional groupings. Here we come to what kind of cooperation could be made between Sika and OEC. I think it is right to say that there is a considerable convergence in the aims and activities of OEC and Sika. Some of the common aims and activities of the two bodies are political-military dimension of security, combating terrorism, conflict prevention, economic and environmental activities, and cooperation in human dimensions. In other words, these issues in Sika are also coinciding with the so-called three baskets of the OEC. There are also commonalities between Sika's confidence-building measures and the documents on the confidence-building measures of the Helsinki Final Act. Of course, it will not be out of place to mention that out of 24 member states of Sika, seven are full members of the OEC, while eight are partner states to the OEC. So there are many states taking place in both organizations. Therefore, I think there is a considerable scope for collaboration and cooperation between Sika and the OEC. Of course, OEC has gained valuable experience in implementation of the confidence-building measures in political-military, human, economic and environmental dimensions, as well as in the field of need threats and challenges and their solutions. On the other hand, Sika has embarked on the path of implementing confidence-building measures in these dimensions only very recently. Therefore, Sika can learn from the experience of OEC in implementing confidence-building measures in different areas. First of all, Sika can learn a lot from the sophisticated and already implemented political-military confidence-building measures of the OEC. However, regional organizations like Sika and OEC have an important role to play in countering new threats and challenges. They can address the issues that are typical and of direct relevance to the respective regions. In recent times, OEC has been increasingly focusing on terrorism and related new threats and challenges to ensure security in the region. Similarly, Sika has also aimed to create a meaningful security environment to meet these challenges in the region through dialogue, cooperation and the confidence building measures among the member states. Therefore, there are indeed excellent prospects for cooperation between Sika and OEC. A modest beginning of this direction has already been made at Sika's invitation. Sika has been participating in seminars, workshops on terrorism organized by OEC during the last two years. Of course, we can and we should do more in this direction. Asia is not only the most important source of energy, but also been showing remarkable economic growth over the last few years. Asia has emerged as a manufacturing hub and source of supply for cheap goods to the West. Therefore, trade and economic ties between Asia and transatlantic region adds to the global stability and comprehensive security. Last but not least, Sika can also avail itself of the highly developed human rights mechanism of the OEC, especially in cooperation with ODIR. However, we should be realistic, Mr. Chairman, because we are aware that the nature of the challenges faced by Sika is different from the challenges faced by the OEC. We therefore need, at first, to identify the specific issues on which the two structures can cooperate and adopt a step-by-step approach in carrying forward this cooperation on a long-time basis. As a first step, the secretaries of Sika and OEC can start working together in identifying these issues carefully and the nature of cooperation also can be studied. As wisely stated by President Nur Sultan Nazar Bey of Kazakhstan at the Third Sika Summit last year, by that time he was the chairman of the OEC and he is the founder of Sika. That should be a closer and institutional relation between the two organizations. I think today's meeting gives us an excellent opportunity to promote this cooperation. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you very much, Ambassador. That was an excellent comprehensive overview of Sika. Let me see if I can pass my little test. The seven member countries that are members of both organizations, Turkey, the five Central Asian states, and Russia. And I am a so-called Russia expert. We're not five Central Asian states, Mr. Minister, I'm not a member of Sika. No, but Azerbaijan is also. There we go. Alexander, the floor is yours. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and let me maybe start by slightly disagreeing with you and I immediately apologize for that. I think that probably there is no need to rename the OEC. That's often in this town. Really, but for me it's the first time and I kind of feel uncomfortable, but what I want to say is that probably there is no need to rename the OEC as you, I think, suggested at the very beginning, because what we see is a new and rather promising organization in the making in Asia itself, which is Sika. So that's why, and I think that that's the focus of this seminar is a very right one, we have to think jointly about how we should improve cooperation between the OEC and Sika, in particular as the ongoing developments in North Africa or as we call it in the OEC in South Mediterranean is a strong reminder to all of us of how closely interlinked security is between neighboring regions. And in our case, for example, OEC and Sika, we are two neighboring, I would say, overlapping regions with shared membership, which already was mentioned here. So I will try to be brief in what I will say and let me maybe structure it in two parts. I will briefly say about the essence of the OEC approach to new security threats and challenges, or in the OEC we call them transnational security threats and challenges, and secondly to say a few words about the OEC's cooperation with Sika. So on the first one, just maybe to summarize briefly that the OEC has been dealing with new threats or transnational threats and challenges for almost a decade. Basically we have started to actively get involved in this area after 9-11, which actually sharpened the international understanding of the magnitude and global scope of the new security threats and OEC, of course, was one of those organizations who reacted immediately. So over the past decade we build networks, we actually work to promote good practices, and we were trying to work in niches, supplementing the efforts of other organizations. Those niches have included areas such as combating terrorism, organized crime, including illicit drug trafficking and trafficking in human beings, strengthening capacities in body security and management and in law enforcement, or controlling the spread of small arms and light weapons. Actually in the last two years, last year and this year, within the OEC there has been quite a comprehensive review among participating states about the efficiency of the OEC working in this area of combating transnational security threats, and also probably about identifying new niche areas where the OEC can play a useful role, such as, for example, cybersecurity or implementation of the UN Security Council Resolution 1540. So over the years we have developed certain institutional capacities, participating states adopted political strategies and decisions, and we accumulated certain rich experience in fostering the implementation of the global UN conventions and in assisting our participating states in enhancing their relevant capacities. The second point here I would like to mention is that the OEC has approached transnational threats from a cross-dimensional perspective and in a comprehensive way, which actually is in line overall with the organization's overall cooperative and comprehensive approach to security. And in this approach, upholding human rights and promoting functioning democratic institutions bears equal weight alongside the political, military and economic and environmental security dimensions. And as I mentioned, now participating states are reviewing this work. It's still an ongoing process. The Secretary General prepared upon the request of participating states two rather comprehensive reports of the current OEC working those areas. The work is being continued so I don't want to go into details of our internal kitchen, especially that, as I said, this process has yet to be finished. But I would say, and this is my third point about transnational security threats, that one conclusion which is obvious and which is relevant for this discussion is that increased interaction and synergy with other organizations is critical in dealing effectively with transnational threats, especially now actually at times of financial constraints and limited resources experienced by national governments and experienced by, I would dare to say, all international and regional organizations OEC is not an exception. And here I come to the second part of what I would like to say is about our cooperation with SICA, because SICA is clearly one of those regional organizations to which OEC pays much attention. And I think the fact that my organization has decided to send it representative to this seminar is an indication of the importance that we do attach to our interaction with SICA. If we look, I think, at our cooperation with SICA, I would say that it is sort of driven by three factors. The first is our actually shared, I believe, recognition of the global reach of new threats and of the need to cooperate in addressing them. The second is our shared membership and Ambassador Aldemir mentioned those member states and partners that we have in common. And I would say that these countries actually play a role of an important bridge between our two organizations. I think it was Kazakhstan and Turkey who actually sort of have been in the lead of bringing OCE and SICA closer together through a rather consistent effort through a number of years. And third, this is a similar approach that the two organizations have to addressing security threats and challenges. Ambassador Tulun mentioned the motto of the Turkish SICA chairmanship constructing cooperative security in Asia while actually OCE has been a pioneer in promoting the very concept of comprehensive cooperative security from the very first days of the establishment of the OCE. I then would like to say that from my personal opinion that in recent years the OCE SICA cooperation has already made a significant progress. Last year was in particular dynamic as the 2010 OCE Kazakh chairmanship paid much attention to promoting closer OCE SICA contacts. I think that by now we have developed better mutual knowledge and understanding. On our side at least we probably know much more about a SICA than we used to know a couple of years ago. And I hope that for SICA also OCE is better known as an organization which is largely thanks to our regular cross participation in each other's events and to several visits by the representatives of SICA secretariat to the OCE secretariat where we try actually to share whatever modest experience we have. And I would say then that actually the essence of our interactions so far has been actually the sharing of mutual experience. This is important and I think it needs to be continued. And the OCE is open to sharing the merits of comprehensive and cooperative security and its rich experience across the three security dimensions. Such as for example confidence building measures that was mentioned here by a number of previous speakers where the OCE certainly has developed a significant experience over the decades actually of its work and existence. For example I'm pretty sure that if ODEAR would be invited to a given future SICA event my colleagues from ODEAR would be happy actually to attend and to share their relevant experience. I know that for example SICA will be holding an activity on combating trafficking in human beings at the end of May in Anatolia. Again I'm sure that our special representative on combating trafficking in human beings if necessary would be happy actually to exchange views and mutual experiences. But also I think that as SICA increasingly develops its relevant capacities and practical activities in particular in addressing transnational threats this might be actually time to think about probably going slightly beyond the mere exchange of experience and expertise that characterize the initial stage of our interaction but also to explore more practical ways of engaging with each other in addressing some of the security threats and challenges. Of course pending the agreement of our participating and SICA's member states because as it was pointed out earlier today both organizations are based on consensus of its participating member states. For example and then when we think in those terms I think Afghanistan certainly comes to the mind as an important element of possible OCE SICA practical cooperation. It is both SICA member states and important OCE partner for cooperation as I remember at its last meeting of senior officials SICA adopted actually a concept paper and participation in the Afghanistan co-group. The OCE is also part of that group that brings together a number of regional organizations and institutions engaged with Afghanistan and OCE itself has been engaged with Afghanistan since 2003 when Afghanistan actually became our Asian partner for cooperation. The OCE has provided election support on four occasions to the actually national parliamentary and presidential elections in the country. We sponsor more or less regularly participation by representatives from Afghanistan in relevant OCE activities and in 2007 in Madrid OCE participating states adopted a decision on OCE engagement with Afghanistan which actually is the only decision specific decision that OCE has vis-a-vis its given partner state partner for cooperation and in implementation of that decision 16 extra budgetary projects have been developed and implemented within a focus on strengthening borders between Central Asian states and Afghanistan fostering cross-border and law enforcement cooperation and capacity building and training on border security and management police and customs. So as you heard earlier today from the representative of the Lithuanian embassy the Lithuanian OCE chairmanship sees the promotion of closer cooperation and building synergies between the OCE and other international regional and sub-regional organizations and institutions as one of its priorities and as I see at least the continuing interest on both sides OCE and SICA in developing cooperation I see leadership displayed by Turkey, Kazakhstan, Lithuania so personally I'm quite optimistic about the prospects of the OCE SICA cooperation thank you very much. Thanks very much Alex Alexander. A question of clarification one of the things I do know about SICA was that they were a member of the core group of regional organizations that met in Kabul on the eve of the Kabul conference on July 19th ECOSARC Shanghai Cooperation Organization The OCE though you were there as well. Yes. Okay very good thanks and with that that's a perfect transition moment to turn to Dr. Jalali and I must remind our panelists that the time is limited and that we are scheduled to move to reception at 6 o'clock. Thank you chair and good afternoon. I appreciate the remarks made here during this panel and before and I also value what OCE and SICA has done in the past few years. I am familiar with both organizations during my previous reincarnation. In 1990s when I was covering Central Asia for the voice of America as analyst of the region for many years I covered the five Central Asian states and where I came across the activities of OCE particularly in the conflict of Tajikistan which I covered extensively from 1993 to all the way to 1997 when the cord was made and in the same time OCE's actions and operations and Azerbaijan was covered by me. With SICA also I have a history. When that idea was first offered or expressed by President Nur Sultana Zarbayev I was lucky to have several interviews with him and one of these interviews I at length actually asked him about the challenges facing that because at that time he was trying to support that idea as another organization in line with OCE. I am happy to see that this idea is now working and as far as Afghanistan is concerned Afghanistan is a founding member of SICA at the same time. Afghanistan is a partner for cooperation of OCE since 2003. The title of this conference is Regional Approach to Regional Problems two very complex things and with regional problems and then how difficult it is to bring some kind of reconciled diverging definition of problems among countries and then to reconcile the diverging approaches of different countries so good luck to you. It is something we can talk about but we have to realize and recognize the fact that Afghanistan is a member of several organizations like this organization and still we have the problem. Therefore I want to share some ideas from my experience as a former journalist and analyst as a foreign minister of interior Afghanistan and before that as a member of resistance against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Sometimes I call Afghanistan a theme park of problems and it is true you find any problem you can find it there and therefore the challenges facing Afghanistan in the context of that region is a microcosm of transnational threats that is today faced by many nations in a globalized world. However the complexity comes when you look at these threats in different dimension it's local it is regional and it is global all these things. So therefore sometimes I think that maybe that Afghanistan is probably a test case for these organizations whether they can deal with these different threats in a kind of coordinated way. At the same time I believe Afghanistan could serve as engine of transformation of the procedures that actually governs the operation in action of these different organizations. I probably say this also for NATO. For new NATO if new NATO is going to deal with the new kind of threats which are different from traditional threat that NATO actually give birth to NATO then I think Afghanistan can be a test case at the same time engine for transformation. Having said that during my initial years in Central Asia the Central Asia often looked at was looked at from a Eurasian perspective. Many challenges however the region faced is going to face are linked to the south. Both Central Asia and South Asia face common security challenges including the threat of terrorism, religious extremism, trafficking of narcotics and arms. However I would like to emphasis here one thing that unfortunately sometimes I hear it is too much emphasis of drug trafficking as a major threat between Afghanistan and Central Asia. Of course it's a threat. I dealt with it and found it very difficult three years ago as a Minister of Interior. However I hear also some views that to establish a coordination around Afghanistan this will do the thing. Problems of trafficking does not happen on the borders. It's somewhere else. Borders of course is important controlling border important but no country in the world can see a border including here in the United States look at the south, Mexico. Certainly Afghanistan cannot do it with Pakistan. Of course there are certain activities going on. I also appreciate the cooperation from different countries to do this but I think drug trafficking in Afghanistan is the cause and result of instability in Afghanistan. Unless you deal with instability in Afghanistan you can stop the drug trafficking in the border. At the same time you try to seal one area. Let me give you some example from Afghanistan border. We actually tried to seal several parts of that border. However it's 151,500 kilometers but the people who were this side of the border in the other side of the border we have to remind ourselves that drug trafficking is not done by only one party. Several parties in different countries. So they came up with very innovative ways and means. Even we discovered homemade gliders who were taking the drug from this side of the border to the other side of the border. So therefore it is not only just stopping drug trafficking in the border. You have to help that country to build itself unless you mainstream drug counter-anarchotic issue. In all aspects of development, governance, security and development you cannot deal with it in a separate issue. But the issue of terrorism of course Afghanistan is a source of problems for Central Asian countries. Even today the Tajik Uzbekistan Islamic organization Uzbekistan and also in the north of Afghanistan is a lot to deal with instability in Uzbekistan. In Tajikistan today in Qalategine once after the P Street it was what was called today it is becoming more unstable. And as long as northern Afghanistan is stable this situation will continue. And at the same time there are problems with the weapons trafficking women weapons in human being. These are all problems on board. However in order to deal with these of course we have to seal the border. At the same time in order to deal with it at the long term you have to go to the source. You cannot solve a problem unless you go to the source, the sources of Afghanistan. You have to help Afghanistan build itself, stabilize itself, build institutions that can actually be of kind of effectiveness in Afghanistan and the region. I'm happy to see that the transition strategy of use is working very well militially. However it's fragile. Unless this military success that we see today in Helmand, Kandahar and other even in the north is sustained by good governance, the rule of law, good institution, security institution it is would be fragile and reversible. And I believe that the best thing that regional organization can do is to help Afghanistan help itself, help Afghanistan to build the capacity so that it can deal with these issues in an effective way. I'm not going to talk more about the cooperation, what kind of a cooperation can we expect for SICA or OCE or other organizations. Let me come to a few conclusions that I would like to offer here. First the regional organization can help only if they can find the right context for it. What is the context? It's a local, a regional or a rural one. You have to find the context first that in that context you can become effective. The second, I think everything starts from bilateral cooperation. Without bilateral cooperation it is very difficult to hope for a regional solution of problems. However, the regional organizations can bring some synergy to these bilateral kind of cooperation. And this is something that we expect from regional organization. The other issue we have to realize that there are certain obstacles in the region that can actually undermine whatever cooperation you try to support. One is the kind of different procedures between countries, different perspectives on issues in different countries. You remember that in 1990s the three contiguous oblasts or provinces in Fargana Valley of three countries. That is Osh, Khudjand, Osh in Kyrgyzstan, Khudjand in Tajikistan and Andijan in Uzbekistan. They actually created a kind of consortium to deal with drug trafficking. Soon, and not in a very long, the cooperation got mired in political and security, actually problems and divergences. So therefore it is not nothing can happen in a vacuum. We have to realize that security, political issues in different countries can actually affect, can boost or undermine certain cooperation projects. The corruption is everywhere. In Afghanistan you have corruption as far as drug trafficking and terrorist activities are concerned. You have it across the border, you have it in Pakistan, you have it in Iran. While 40 to 50 percent of Afghan drugs passes through Iran to Turkey, somebody is helping that. I appreciate the cooperation from Iran and the UK that helped us during my term to build 25 security posts along Afghan, Iranian border. But still the traffickers find ways to bypass them. How they do it, it is both the problems in Afghanistan, both in Iran and beyond. At the same time, I would say that while these issues are affecting the security and stability in the short term. I think the long-term solution, the ideal, which is not probably the potential is there, but I don't expect that it will happen. That is the transnational trade and transit trade cooperation. Afghanistan is disadvantaged by being a landlocked country. However, traditionally Afghanistan used that location it has between South Asia and Central Asia to be a bridge for transnational transit trade and other cooperation. Historically these two regions dealt with each other in different ways. Sometimes the invasion came from the north, ideas went from the south to the north, but at the same time the time came that the two countries or the two regions found a way to enrich each other. Today it is possible, however, as long as security and political issues create divergent perspectives on the issue, it will be difficult. However, it does not mean we have to stop. I think we have to take each issue one by one. Today there are certain issues working. The export of power from Central Asia to Afghanistan, Pakistan, the TAPI, the pipeline from Turkmenistan to Afghanistan to Pakistan and India. And also the recent agreements between Afghanistan, Iran, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan to create a kind of a system of land transportation between Central Asia, Iran and Europe. The Indian project which is completed now from Zaransh del Aram which enjoys the Ring Road of Afghanistan and then to Shah Bahar. These are all projects that you have to take one by one before you can expect that a major project can bring fruit to that region. I will stop here and I thank you very much for your attention. Thank you very much, Professor Jalali, for the very, very thoughtful remarks. I think it is an ideal segue to our next speaker, Jared Blank, who has been dealing with the theme park of problems as you were referred to Afghanistan from his perch in the office of the Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan. Jared. Thank you very much and thank you to CSIS and thank you to all of my colleagues on the panel now and the previous panels for what have been, I think, extremely informative discussions. I am not by any means an expert on either the OSCE or SICA and so I'll be brief and I'll be focused on the role of Afghanistan and the region and the region in Afghanistan. Secretary of State Clinton spoke to the Asia Society in New York three weeks ago and outlined U.S. strategy toward Afghanistan and Pakistan. If you haven't yet read her speech, it's available on the Internet and I would strongly commend it. It's a very public and very comprehensive statement of how we see the coming year. She talked about three interlocking surges, a military offensive against Al Qaeda terrorists and Taliban insurgents, a civilian campaign to bolster the government's economies and civil societies of Afghanistan and Pakistan to undercut the pull of the insurgency, and finally an intensified diplomatic push to bring the Afghan conflict to an end and to chart a new and more secure future for the region. I think that it's clear that OSCE and SICA and the two of them, especially in cooperation, have important things to contribute on both the second and the third of those surges. A civilian surge in governance, economics, and civil society and a new diplomatic push to bring the conflict to an end. So I'll just briefly give some thoughts about directions in both of those areas and thoughts that I think align very closely to what Minister July Zordi said. In the second surge of governance, economics, and civil society, I think that there are two things that these organizations can look to do. The first is that the governance problems of Afghanistan, of course, are partially the cause of and partially the result of things like the trade in narcotics and some of its subsidiary trade. So for example, precursor chemicals for the production of narcotics, the trade in ammonium nitrate fertilizer, which is not legal in Afghanistan, which is used to create improvised explosive devices. So both of these organizations, I think, have a role to play in creating both the legal infrastructure and also providing technical assistance to implement the legal infrastructure to address some of the illicit elements of trade. And then there's a more direct, I think, thing that both organizations can contribute and which the OSCE certainly is doing quite a bit of already, which is capacity building for Afghan civil servants, for civil society leaders, for journalists, for others. So that some of the problems in Afghanistan can be addressed more comprehensively, more thoughtfully by Afghan leaders themselves. So more of that from both organizations, I think, could be very valuable. On the diplomatic push, and I think on this point I'm actually just going to quote the Secretary, who said that all of Afghanistan's neighbors and near neighbors stand to benefit from a responsible political settlement in Afghanistan and to an end of Talkeh to safe havens. It would reduce the terrorist and narcotic threat to their own citizens, create new opportunities for commerce, and ease the free flow of energy and resources throughout the region. And so I think that we can think about this regional diplomatic push, both in terms of the diplomacy that needs to be done, but also in terms of some of the enabling things that need to be done to take advantage of future successes and then achieve some of those things on regional trade, on addressing the narcotics threat, et cetera. And those are all areas where I think these two organizations can be very, very helpful. Minister Jalal has already pointed out transit trade, which is critical for Afghanistan and critical for the region. The Afghanistan-Pakistan Transit Trade Agreement, which was signed at the end of last year, ratified at the beginning of this year, and which will go into force this summer, is probably the most important bilateral agreement between the two countries since their founding. I think it also serves as a potential model for transit trade agreements between Afghanistan and its neighbors to the north. It's clear, though, that even if we were to overcome the tremendous hurdles to get to those agreements, there's a lot of work that needs to be done to actually make them effectively implementable. And I think both organizations have something that they can contribute on the creation of the legal regime and then also the implementation of the legal regime. And similarly, I think on the free flow of energy and on essentially knitting together a more cohesive region, both because of the hoped-for effects of the regional diplomatic push and also in a sense to bolster and reinforce them so that the region as a whole has something to gain through a sustained peace and something to lose through a loss of what the minister, I think, has correctly described as the fragile and reversible gains seen so far. So with that, I think, again, thanks to the organizers and thanks to the two organizations for the creative work already underway. Thanks very much for your focused remarks and I completely agree with you about the comment about the Afghanistan-Pakistan Trade and Transit Agreement, both in its significance and as well as its potential as a model for other trade and transit agreements in the region. Before I turn to James Callahan from the State Department, I will bid you adieu and call on my colleague, Bulent Alaritza, to chair the rest of the panel, and I apologize for that. And I'm even going to make a self-advertisement, I can't resist, after the comments of Minister Jalali and Jared about an article that I have coming out in the next issue of the Washington Quarterly that looks precisely at the imperative and the challenges for developing this regional economic strategy and cooperation around Afghanistan. So thank you very much. Let me turn the floor over to Mr. Callahan. Thank you. As it's getting close to six o'clock, I'll try to be very brief as well. Fortunately, Mr. Jalali has covered some of the issues that I would have talked about at greater length, corruption being one of those most important ones. I think it's useful to consider that the threat of narcotics trafficking in the region for all of the countries of the region, it's not just an idle threat. You can look at what happened in Kyrgyzstan recently and see the power of drug-related money, drug-related organized crime, as having had some influence in the events in the southern Kyrgyzstan in June during the inter-ethnic conflict there. Whether it was a driving force or simply took advantage of it is difficult to say, but it does indicate that the ability of organized crime to raise money for whatever purposes it wants can be quite destabilizing for governments. Additionally, as has already been expressed quite well, the terrorist organizations do use drug-related funding for their own purposes, not that they're trafficking necessarily themselves, but the traffickers often are supporting those organizations, supporting the Taliban in the region. Additionally, of course, the countries of the region are afflicted by in Central Asia as well as and certainly in Pakistan and Iran and Afghanistan itself, high rates now of drug abuse by their own citizens. They're no longer simply transit countries but also their destination countries. And related to this has been a spike in HIV-AIDS, which is driven by injecting drug users in the region. Just a short history of drug production or opiates production in Afghanistan. There are some who seem to believe that this only took off after 9-11 and the invasion of Afghanistan by the international community. As a result, actually the production of opiates in Afghanistan started taking place during the period after the Soviets left when there was a period of warlordism and then when the Taliban took over. During that period, during the period that the Taliban controlled most of Afghanistan, it became the world's largest producer of opiates. And only in the year 2000, 2001, did the Taliban for whatever reason ban opiate production in Afghanistan and brought that number down significantly. But of course after 9-11 in the conflict that followed that and in the period of instability as well as the military actions, farmers were able then to start producing opium again. No one really knows what would have happened had 9-11 not happened and had the Taliban been put to the test of another year of a poppy ban. There are many who think that it was only done to force prices up. But any event, as you all know, that the production of opiates in Afghanistan then began another period of rapid growth. Certainly the U.S. government didn't pay enough attention. The international community didn't pay enough attention to what was happening in regard to production of opium and heroin. And that has certainly led to an increase during that period of funding available to the Taliban to reinitiate their own activities. In terms of Central Asia, which is my area of specialty, I would mention that Iran and Pakistan both have very serious drug abuse problems themselves. And as has been mentioned are certainly major transit areas. But in terms of Central Asia, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime estimate that 25-30% of the opiates that are trafficked out of Afghanistan go across the northern border. And the primary destination is, of course, Russia. Very little of that, of those opiates from Afghanistan actually affect the United States. But it's U.S. policy to do all we can to support the governments of the region and support Afghanistan in combating trafficking because of the impact it has on security and stability in the region. I'd say that all countries in the region, in the Central Asian countries, take the issue very seriously. They see the impact on their own population of drug abuse, of increased HIV rates, as well as the potential for extremists to use drug-related profits to destabilize their own countries. That said, and has already been said, corruption is certainly a major issue to a greater or lesser degree in all the countries. So that if you look at the amounts of opiates that are being trafficked through there and the numbers of seizures year by year, the seizures are very small. This isn't terribly unusual because as we've seen on our own border, it's very difficult to seize a very high percentage of drugs. But it is indicative that there is something more than simply traffic by unaffiliated traffickers and organized crime itself. The problem of official collusion is one that has to be dealt with in all of the countries of the region. The U.S. at this point is working very heavily, I would say, in Afghanistan to work with the counter-narcotics authorities. The State Department has a large program working with the Drug Enforcement Agency and other U.S. agencies with the counter-narcotics police of Afghanistan. And I would say very effectively in terms of developing units, vetted units, and task forces that have had great success in Afghanistan in seizing drugs and in actually going after high-value traffickers in the organized crime networks. Again, corruption does not always, it means that it does not always work the way we'd like it to work in terms of convictions, but it certainly is a great step forward and in many ways is an example for what we would like to do to work with the other governments in the region. In terms of the regional issue, there really has not been very much regional focus on counter-narcotics. It tends to be done on a country-by-country basis in Afghanistan and Central Asia and Pakistan without a real strategy for the most part. Looking at what other organizations are doing in the region, the European Commission has had two programs in Central Asia for a number of years now. Fairly well-funded programs, one the Border Management Program for Central Asia, BOMCA, and the other the Central Asian Drug Action Plan, which now is primarily focused on drug demand reduction. Unfortunately, these being a regional program, they really are not implemented as a regional program. They're implemented really on a country-by-country basis and they don't involve an overall strategy. The CSTO has been mentioned. CSTO does have a role in the region in promoting counter-narcotics activities, but it has been quite limited to date. Again, it doesn't seem to involve a regional strategy and primarily focuses on an annual operation called Operation Canal, in which a number of the countries who are members of the CSTO collate their statistics on drug seizures, but it does not seem to be what we would call a real operation. The NATO-Russia Council is quite involved. One of the more successful programs or projects of the NATO-Russia Council has been a training program that's been in effect since 2006 to train Central Asian and Afghan counter-narcotics police often together to promote regional cooperation. They are trained primarily at the Doma-Data training center outside of Moscow. Now they're also training in St. Petersburg. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency's administration is working with the Russians now in some of those training centers. There are mobile training teams that operate in the region. The Turkish government through the Turkish Academy on Organized Crime, Against Organized Crime and Drug Trafficking, TADUC, is very active in managing training teams in that region. Again, though, it is focused entirely on training and really is not part of an overall strategy. The United Nations Regional Center for Central Asia, which is a preventive diplomacy center, has as one of its priorities the issue of drug trafficking as well as counter-terrorism. It, though, does not have a programmatic or strategic view so far of dealing with drug trafficking and is primarily providing a certain level of analysis. I would say that the organization in the region, which is most effective in terms of developing strategies, maybe no organization is that effective yet in actually combating the traffic in the area, but in terms of developing strategies, it has been the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. They've had strategies in Central Asia. They have a memorandum of understanding with all of the Central Asian countries as well as Russia and Azerbaijan, which has been in effect since about 1997. That has formed a basis for a number of projects which are done on a regional basis to promote intelligence collection and analysis and sharing among agencies and among countries in the region, as well as computer-based training programs and programs on control deliveries and precursors. Probably the most effective regional program that the UNODC has had has been on precursors, which has been running not just in Central Asia but Afghanistan and Pakistan and Iran. Additionally, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime has a number of strategies under what they call their rainbow strategy, which includes separate strategies to promote intelligence sharing between Afghanistan, Iran and Pakistan, the Caspian Sea Initiative, which is to promote, again, intelligence sharing and cooperation among the Caspian Sea border states. The Paris Pact is the overall umbrella, I guess, organization in a sense that manages the rainbow strategy and for which UNODC is the secretariat. The Paris Pact is made up of a number of nations that are on the trafficking routes from Afghanistan as well as organizations. OSCE is a member of the Paris Pact, as is the European Commission. So these are areas that are working on a regional basis. Part of the Central Asia strategy has been to develop the Central Asian Regional Information Coordination Center, which is based in Almaty. As I understand it, that's also home to the SICA. So there could be definitely the possibility of some synergies there. The CARIC has all the members of the MOU states, including Russia, which just recently signed formally the ratification of the CARIC agreement, the only country that has not signed the agreement, although it has signed at the presidential level but has not ratified, is Uzbekistan. There is high hope that now that Russia has signed that Uzbekistan may follow suit. That organization has been dedicated to analyzing the situation, to sharing intelligence, and to promoting operations in the region. And they've had a number of successful operations with the observer states, a number of operations in Turkey as well as in the broader region. Afghanistan is an observer of the CARIC as well as Italy, the United States government, the United Kingdom and Germany. China is looking at the possibilities of observer status. So again, the fact that it's located in Almaty may offer opportunities for synergies with SICA. Certainly discussions about possibilities for cooperation. What I would say in regard to regional counter-narcotics issues is a coordination issue. There has been a problem in the region of a lack of coordination among international organizations and among the countries working on a bilateral basis, our own included. And there's a great need that if new initiatives are going to be promoted by organizations in the counter-narcotics area, that that really needs to be closely coordinated with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime and others. And the Paris Pact obviously provides an opportunity to do that. There will be a policy level meeting of the Paris Pact in Vienna on the 17th of March this month and I'm sure that OSCE will be participating in that. So that's just a brief overview of what's going on in the region related to counter-narcotics and a hope that OSCE and SICA can join into that effort again on a very coordinated basis. Thank you. Last speaker as well as all the other speakers on this panel as I close this panel as well as the conference. It was very informative. I'd like to thank all the participants, both those who spoke and as well as those who attended and closing the conference that we invite everybody to enjoy the reception which I had announced at the beginning or earlier that we would now have. And any questions you may have in mind, please take it up with the panelists later. Thank you all.