Last year there were two ministers, this year there will be five Norwegian government members participating in the private security conference in Munich. The large turnout is due to the desire to strengthen unity and contact with allies. – We are witnessing that the security political order we have lived with since the fall of the Berlin Wall is over, says Climate and Environment Minister Espen Barth Eide (Ap). Climate and Environment Minister Espen Barth Eide (Ap) calls the Munich conference the most important of its kind, where the issues discussed are particularly important in a troubled time. Photo: Anders Tvegård / news Eide is participating for the 17th time this weekend. – Geopolitical contradictions, the energy, resource and food crisis together with an increasingly serious climate and nature crisis require new joint solutions. The Munich conference is an excellent opportunity to exchange views and seek answers, says Eide to news. A new reality Top managers and key players in security, defence, foreign affairs and intelligence meet in fashionable surroundings in Bavaria after almost a year of war in Europe. Heavyweights are gathering in the middle of Munich to discuss security policy this weekend. Photo: Michael Probst / AP Russia’s war of invasion has not only taken the lives of thousands of civilians, forced millions to flee and destroyed homes and infrastructure worth billions of kroner. Moscow has also attacked the foundations and principles the world has built up after the Second World War, writes the conference’s organizer in its annual report. Battle for values The increased tension between the US and China is also receiving extra attention. There may be delegates from the two countries resuming contact in the corridors to get new talks underway. Long lines in security policy are also discussed in Munich, with topics related to: Human rights Global infrastructures and the danger of becoming economically vulnerable Refugee movements and models for aid Lack of disarmament among nuclear states Undermining value chains Authoritarian moves and how regimes increasingly ignore rules of the game and global institutions . – We see to a greater extent that there are two views of the world and society. There are different values that collide, says Defense Minister Bjørn Arild Gram (Sp) to news. Defense Minister Bjørn Arild Gram (Sp) travels to Munich with fresh impressions from the NATO defense ministers’ meeting. Photo: Simen Ekern / news Gram believes that Western countries are concerned with open, liberal, democratic societies, while Russia and China want something else. – It is important that we understand this development in countries that do not share our values, so that we are able to protect ourselves, says Gram. The organizers will address the resentment that countries in Africa, Central America and Asia have had against the international order. The countries have expressed that the rules of the game do not always serve their interests. The lack of respect for an international order was also a topic at the Leangkollen conference at the Norwegian Atlantic Committee last week. The door is closed for Russia and Iran Opposition parties from Russia and Iran are invited, but government officials from these two countries are not given a platform at the security conference this year. Protests have been announced, including against the regime in Iran, while the conference is in progress. Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre (Ap) is going to Munich with four ministers, three of them in this picture: Foreign Minister Anniken Huitfeldt (Ap), Climate and Environment Minister Espen Barth Eide (Ap) and Development Minister Anne Beathe Tvinnereim (Sp). Defense Minister Bjørn Arild Gram (Sp) is also going to the security meeting in southern Germany this weekend. Photo: Anders Tvegård / news Espen Barth Eide believes this is the most important conference of its kind. He believes that it is just as interesting what happens in the corridors as in the meeting rooms. – It is a meeting place between some of the world’s foremost leaders in a broad field. Networks are built here and it happens without many advisers around. Only that has its own value, says Eide to news. Harris meets the Nordics US Vice President Kamala Harris boarded Air Force Two on Wednesday evening, bound for Munich. It is seen as one of her most important foreign trips as vice president. US Vice President Kamala Harris returns to Munich. Photo: Matt Marton / AP When Kamala Harris was there last year, she promised full support for Ukraine. Now the promise must be renewed at the same time as the war’s costs have become more noticeable. The US vice president has also arranged for meetings with the prime ministers of Sweden and Finland. NATO has signaled that the two applicant countries do not necessarily have to be admitted as members of the military alliance at the same time. Russia will have twice as long a border with NATO NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg will also participate in the Security Conference in Munich. He comes directly from Turkey, where the NATO applications are being discussed. He believes that Sweden and Finland will be accepted as members at the latest during the NATO summit this summer, but is open to the countries joining at different times. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg believes the Russian president has failed with the invasion of Ukraine, and is getting the opposite of what he sought. Photo: Anders Tvegård / news – Putin doesn’t get what he wants. He underestimated the Ukrainian defense. He underestimated NATO and overestimated his own forces, says Stoltenberg to the Nordic press. According to Stoltenberg, Putin’s purpose in invading Ukraine was to stop NATO’s expansion. Putin is now getting the opposite of what he sought. – There will be more military presence and two new NATO members that will double NATO’s border with Russia. Putin has failed, says Stoltenberg. Two moments from Munich 2007: Russian President Vladimir Putin believed that the West had abused Russia’s weakness when the country was down. He lashed out at the US and warned NATO not to get any closer. Putin referred to a speech from 1990 in which then NATO Secretary General Manfred Wörner was interpreted as giving the Soviet Union guarantees that the military alliance would not expand eastwards. 2003: German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer said no to the war in Iraq from the podium. He switched to English when he confronted the US defense secretary, challenging the evidence and saying he was not convinced. The Munich Security Conference was founded in 1963 by Ewald-Heinrich von Kleist. He was one of the officers who planned to kill Adolf Hitler. He created a meeting place for American and German politicians in the middle of the Cold War. The first gathering was held a couple of years after the Berlin Wall came up, and a few months after the confrontation between the Soviet Union and the United States over missiles in Cuba. Now there are over 150 delegates from several countries participating in the Security Conference this weekend.
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Five Norwegian ministers are to meet on Europe’s security – news Urix – Foreign news and documentaries
