OSCE Head, Swiss President Burkhalter to Eurofora on Ukraine + PanEuropean Security

*Basel/OSCE Annual Ministerial Summit/Angelo Marcopolo/- Since Basel Nights are long and facilitate  Contacts, as he said, and hoping that the need to settle the Tragic Ukranian Crisis, would rather Stimulate the more than 50 Foreign Ministers who started Tonight to be gathered here for the Annual Ministerial Summit of the PanEuropean Organisation for Security and Cooperation, than provoke Sterile Divisions which would risk to Weaken it instead,the determined OSCE's 2014 Chairman and Swiss President, Didier Burkhalter, would like both to help  Advance further on the resolution and the Cease-Fire consolidation in Ukraine, and take Wider Decisions to develop in the foreseable Future a Stronger OSCE role in the PanEuropean Security system, which emerged since the End of the Cold War, as it results from the Replies that he gave to "EuroFora" and other Journalists' Questions at the Eve of the Political event which starts in an exceptional overall context.

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Meanwhile, President Burkhalter appeared to agree with "EuroFora"'s observation, that, on 2014, even if OSCE has not yet built an official PanEuropean Security Mechanism, (a Central Issue on which "EuroFora" had already questioned him earlier at the CoE in Strasbourg, finding in him both genuine Interest, and Realistic attitude ; See :http://www.eurofora.net/newsflashes/news/swissoscepresidency.html ), at least, under his Chairmanchip, OSCE has almost started to Do so, in real Practice, "De Facto"....

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Thus, Questioned by "EuroFora" on what he would advise to do for Ukraine also in the foreseable Future, he appeared as always both Ambitious and Realisticaly Practical :

 - "I would Advise to Work to have a Close Relationship in the Peace  process and the JCCC (Joint Center for Control and Coordination),   where we are consolidating the Basis of European Security", as he said.

- "This is something that, may be, it would have been a Good advise, if we had done that Before.... ", he regrettted.  "But it's very important to do, at least now".
=> - "Therefore, the Swiss Chair will Push Strongly in order to Launch this consensus Dialogue" for now on, he promissed.

     0ne of the most Positive aspects in JCCC's work is that we (OSCE) succeeded to establish a Direct Contact of cooperation between the main actors in the Conflict, in this case in order to implement the Minsk Agreement and consolidate the Cease-Fire, as he explained earlier.

    And, in this regard, a recent Agreement between the involved parties, to jointly act in order to help ensure, Together, a Better Respect of the Cease-Fire these same Days, is obviously "Good News",  later-on Burkhalter added

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    Indeed, OSCE started to prove, this year, particularly with his irremplacable role in helping to face the Eastern Ukranian Crisis, that it can and should be developed further in fully-fledged and unique "Platform for Dialogue and Mediation" throughout the PanEuropean area, and President Burkhalter firmly believes that this should Boost the Organization's Capacity to Act and Effectiveness, in view also of its possible Reform at its forthcoming 40th Anniversary next year, on 2015, under the Chairmanship of Serbia, which participated in Today's Press Conference by the Head of the 2015 Serbian OSCE Chairmanship'"s "Task Force", Ambassador Dejan Šahović.

    Serbia is both traditionaly close to Russia, and also Candidate to EU Accession Today, so that it would rather keep an "Equal Distance" between the two, and that Fits the role of an OSCE Mediator, estimated Burkhalter, while also reminding the fact that Switzerland and Serbia have already prepared Together a 2 Years-long joint Plan for their successive OSCE Presidencies' work, into which  the Swiss President is Committed to continue its active Conntribution also via the "Troika" of OSCE Chairmen, as he observed, speaking to Journalists in Basel, including "EuroFora", later-on.

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    + In addition, OSCE's work needs a useful Complement in the input to be added also by the Strasbourg-based PanEuropean Organisation for Human Rights, Democracy and Rule of Law, i.e. the CoE, which "is, definitively, a very Important Part in that regard", and particularly "for Ukraine", President Buckhalter stressed in reply to anOther Question by "EuroFora".

 - "Yes, it can surely be very Positive for Ukraine if we (OSCE) can Associate the CoE", he stressed.

- In fact, "the CoE is already Active (on Ukraine), F.ex. everything which is Constitutional Reform, or things like that, etc, it's there where we have the (Legal) Expertise", the experienced OSCE Head observed, pointing, indirectly but surely, f.ex. to CoE's "Venice" Commission, which recently checked, last October in Rome, a package of Draft Constitutional Reforms presented by Ukranian President Poroshenko, as promised, for a Crucial "DeCentralisation of Power", a  notoriously Key issue towards a Political Solution of the Eastern Ukraine Crisis.

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 + Meanwhile, as far as it concerns key parts of the "Human Dimension", an NGO's parallel gathering in Basel, according to the Swiss 2014 Chairmanship's wish to boost Civil Society, in its Human Rights-related Conclusions, reveals, inter alia, that, even Today, "Freedom of Expression" issues continue to Topple the Agenda, closely followed by - and related with - also the Need to "Protect Human Rights Defenders". While, astonishingly, it's not only the current need to Safegueard "Personal Data" and "Privacy", particularly in the New Commmunications' Technology sector, but even "Enforced Disappearances", which emerge among the "New" areas of concern inside the OSCE's PanEuropean area, said OSCE's Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights' (ODIHR) Director, Michael Georg Link,.the Journalists present in Basel Tonight, including "Eurofora".

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