The NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen visited Vienna on 30 June 2011 and met with the OSCE Secretary General, Mr. Marc Perrin de Brichambaut, as well as with representatives of the Lithuanian chairmanship of the OSCE.

During the visit, the Secretary General addressed the OSCE Security and Review Conference. In his speech “NATO and the OSCE: Building Security Together”, the Secretary General said that over the past 20 years, NATO and the OSCE together have helped to restore security and stability in the Balkans.

“We often talk about using a Comprehensive Approach in Afghanistan. But actually the Comprehensive Approach has its origins in the Balkans. There the United Nations, the OSCE, the European Union and NATO were all present, all trying to stabilise the region”, the Secretary General said. “And for the first time in modern conflict, the military teams and the civilians realised the true value of co-ordinating their efforts, of planning and conducting operations together and of complementing each others work.”

The Secretary General also noted that NATO and the OSCE have a shared past in making Europe more stable and secure and concluded:

“Our job now, is to make tomorrow even more secure. We need to build upon our successes and reinforce them. We need to look again at old problems, and find new solutions. Be ready for emerging challenges, and together work out how to meet them. And we need to look outside of Europe, and work with our partners around the globe to promote our shared security.”