Chair,

The EU wishes to congratulate you as the new Chair of the Preparatory Commission for 2025, and assure you of its full support and cooperation.

The EU warmly welcomes the nomination of Latvia as Vice-Chairperson of the Commission from Eastern Europe for 2025, as well as the nomination of Ambassador Peter Potman, of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, as a Vice- Chairperson of Working Group A. 

We also wish to thank Namibia for expressing its interest to host the Integrated Field Exercise, as well as the Executive Secretary for his recommendation to approve Namibia as the host country for the IFE in 2026. We fully support Namibia as the host country for the 2026 Integrated Field Exercise.

In this context, we note that the Provisional Technical Secretariat (PTS) does not expect that funding beyond what has already been approved will be required for the Integrated Field Exercise. This is important in view of the other priority funding requirements, especially for the International Monitoring System (IMS) sustainment programme.

Thank you Chair.