Towards "Helsinki +40": The OSCE, the Global Mediterranean, and the Future of Cooperative Security

This report provides a summary of the key issues raised in the international seminar "Towards 'Helsinki +40': The OSCE, the Global Mediterranean, and the Future of Cooperative Security", which was convened at the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Rome on 18 September 2014, with the aim of fostering a discussion about the prospects of Euro-Mediterranean cooperation from a politico-security, economic, environmental, and human perspective, at a time of great instability in the Mediterranean region. The seminar addressed the specific question of how the OSCE, in synergy with other international actors, can help promote a cooperative approach to Mediterranean security. The upcoming fortieth anniversary in 2015 of the CSCE Helsinki Final Act provided the context for a debate which focused both on how the decades-old OSCE-Mediterranean Partnership can be strengthened and on whether and in which ways the "OSCE model" can inspire cooperation-oriented initiatives and processes in the Southern Mediterranean.

Summary report of the international seminar "Towards 'Helsinki +40': The OSCE, the Global Mediterranean, and the Future of Cooperative Security", convened at the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation in Rome on 18 September 2014 and organised within the framework of the New-Med Research Network by the Istituto Affari Internazionali (IAI) and the OSCE Secretariat under the auspices of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, the Swiss Chairmanship of the OSCE and the Italian Presidency of the EU.