Budapest, December 7, 1995
Mr. Chairman, excellencies, fellow delegates,
I am greatly honored to participate in this distinguished forum, which brings together foreign ministers and officials form Europe, the USA and Canada, as well as your newly named partners.
This meeting in Budapest also marks the end of the Hungarian presidency of the O.S.C.E., and I wish to congratulate our hosts on their active chairmanship, and their positive and fruitful efforts towards enhancing the relations between the O.S.C.E. and the Mediterranean partners.
I also wish to congratulate Switzerland on assuming the chairmanship.
This is the first time an Israeli Foreign Minister attends an annual meeting and this, we believe, reflects the strengthening of ties between Europe, the Mediterranean and the Middle East.
Ladies and gentlemen,
This conference is devoted to the various issues related to the establishment of peace in Bosnia, and the development of a common and comprehensive security model for Europe for the twenty-first century. We share with you the hope that the peace agreement in Bosnia, the result of extraordinary statesmanship shown in Dayton, Ohio by the USA, the countries of Europe and the concerned parties will facilitate and precipitate enduring peace in the Balkans.
1995 was a crucial year in our efforts to establish peace in our region. Within the last 12 months, Israel has made peace with Jordan and signed an Interim Agreement with the Palestinian Authority, and established diplomatic relations with Morocco and Mauritania. We hope that 1996 will be of equal significance.
In the next two months, the Israeli military will continue to redeploy outside major Palestinian cities, and the Palestinians will hold elections on January 20th. Permanent status negotiations will commence by May 1996. Our relations with Jordan are expanding, and our relations with several other Arab countries not bordering us are steadily improving. As for Syria and Lebanon, we have repeatedly expressed our sincere desire to advance the peace talks. Peace with Syria is a strategic interest for us, and we believe that it is of equal strategic importance and benefit for Syria as well.
One critical domain of multilateral cooperation is security. Confidence building measures and a network of regional arrangements are issues in which we look forward to benefitting from your vast experience and accumulated knowledge. Some of it is already applied in the multilateral peace efforts with our neighbors.
The O.S.C.E. recently held a very useful seminar in Cairo entitled: "The O.S.C.E. Experience in the Field of Confidence Building". Allow me to take this opportunity to once more extend our offer to hold the next O.S.C.E. seminar in Israel in early 1996.
In closing, I would like to reaffirm our wish to contribute to the rehabilitation of the political process in Bosnia. Israel is willing to join the humanitarian efforts required to reconstruct Bosnia. We have done so in the past, and will be privileged to do so again.
Thank you very much.