“Balkan Conference on Cooperation between the Strategic and Research Centers ” will be held on 9-10 June 2005 in Ankara , at Bilkent Hotel and Conference Center by the initiation of the Center For Strategic Research ( SAM ) of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Turkey and its Romanian and Bulgarian counterparts.

This Founding Conference, which will be opened by the keynote address of the Guest of Honour, H.E. Prof. Dr. Besir Atalay, Minister of State of the Republic of Turkey will host 37 representatives of 22 Strategic and Research Centers from 9 Balkan countries (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Macedonia, Romania, Serbia and Montenegro, and Turkey). Besides SAM, four other research centers from Turkey will be represented at the Conference.

At the Conference which will last for two days, Balkan Strategic and Research Centers will discuss the ways and means of establishing a “ Balkan Communication Network ” in order to create a platform which will provide the Member Centers the opportunity of sharing information about their research and activities, harmonizing their works, organizing joint events and informing the public about all these endeavors. The Balkan Communication Network, which will be open, under certain rules, to the participation of other Balkan Strategic and Research Centers , will have a “Web-site” where all the activities of the Network will be deployed.

Furthermore, the creation of a “ Balkan Contact Group ” will be discussed at the Conference with the purpose to follow the current issues concerning the Balkans and included in the agenda of the International Organizations, and to harmonize the related works and policies to these issues.

The possibilities of analyzing the risks and prevention of new conflicts; rapid settlement of existing frozen crises in the Balkans; promoting the participation of the civil societies and their contribution to sustainable stability and security, as well as peace building processes and promoting a security culture with the aim to establish, develop and strengthen transparency, good governance, human rights and pluralistic democracy at Euro-Atlantic level in the Balkans will also be examined during the Conference.