Later a look at russias foreignpolicy objectives and its relations with the u. S. And europe from the center for the national interest. Our live coverage begins at 12 40 p. M. Eastern on cspan. Nato secretarygeneral Jens Stoltenberg was in washington this week for a twoday visit. Of his stops included a speech at George Washington university where he took questions from students. Topics included russias military buildup and the syrian civil war. This event happened the day after the secretarygeneral met with President Trump. It is just under an hour. [applause] good morning, ladies and gentlemen. As our guests are being seated im steven knapp, president of im steven knapp, president of George Washington university and im pleased to welcome you. When you do have the opportunity to look outside, we have a balcony here with a broad view of our nations capital. This is an excellent symbol of what it means to be the Largest University in the heart of our nations capital. It affords an excellent of our monument, the monument here. We like to think of that as the monument of George Washington university. And this location is extraordinary. If you drew a line from the state Department White house, it would intersect where we are sitting now. That tells you a little bit about the importance of this location. Toaffords us an opportunity have important discussions of events of global significance. I would like to welcome you to todays discussion. Nato in the age of uncertainty, a conversation with the secretary general of the nato. We are honored he could make time during his brief visit to washington to come to our campus. Im pleased with knowledge to acknowledge members of the diplomatic unity for being with us today. Particularly, let me acknowledge his excellency, the the ambassador of bulgaria. Ambassador of georgia. We also have with us the former governor of the commonwealth of virginia, james gilmore. And i would like to extend another welcome to kurt volker. He is now the executive director of the Mccain Institute at Arizona State university. I have to say that as the president in my 10th year here having lived on campus a block from here, i live in a house called the f street house. I mention that because it is where some of the founding discussions for the creation of the nato took place. So we have a pretty intimate, historical connection here. Other connections of George Washington university to nato include the role as the former Elliott School alumni. Include the late general, nato supreme allied commander from 1993 to 1997. And the honorable rose who began her ceremony last year, the first woman to hold that post. It is now my great pleasure to introduce his excellency, Jens Stoltenberg. Jens stoltenberg became the 13th secretary general of nato in october 2014. He began his career at the Norwegian Ministry of environment after earning his postgraduate degree in economics from the university of oslo. He was first elected to his countrys parliament in 1993 and served in a variety of leadership roles. Including that of minister of energy and finance. He served as Prime Minister from 2000 to 2001 and again from 2005 to 2013. As Prime Minister he led the transformation of norways armed forces and increased the highest Capital Expenditure rates and regularly committed norwegian troops to nato peacekeeping. Among his international assignments, he has chaired the United NationsHighlevel Panel on systemwide coherence and his highlevel Advisory Group on Climate Change financing. He also served as u. S. Special envoy on Climate Change. , heecretary general of nato has enhanced transatlantic cooperation and strengthened ties with the European Union to secure peace and Economic Development in europe and beyond. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome secretary general Jens Stoltenberg. [applause] mr. Stoltenberg thank you so much dr. Knapp for those kind words. And thank you to all of you for having me here today. It is a great pleasure to meet you all. Because to be here today, it is one of the most recognized institutions when it comes to educating leaders, especially within diplomacy. And as you mentioned, in nato, we have several people who have gotten their education from the elliot school. And we work very closely with the secretary general who is a graduate from the Elliott School. He will share the debate with me. And he is also a graduate from these schools. So the students at this university and at the Elliott School are the leaders of tomorrow. And therefore, it is a great honor for me to see you and to meet you. I have to say that it isnt only because this is a very recognized institution that i am delighted to be here, but i am also delighted to be here because originally, my plan was to become an academic. So my plan was to do Research Within economics. I started to teach at the university of oslo in economics. And i did that for two years. Then i was off to become the deputy minister of the state of the environment in norway. I promised myself and my wife that i would only stay there for one or two years and then i would go back into academic life. That is a promise i havent been able to keep. Ive stayed in politics since 1990. And i feel that my chances for doing an academic career has diminished. So therefore, i like to visit institutions like this because it is the closest i come to the any kind of academic life. If you fail as an academic, you can become a Prime Minister. [laughter] mr. Stoltenberg i will be very brief. The idea is that we will have an interaction. So i will just share with you some brief remarks or reflections and then we will be available for questions so we can have some discussion. What i will say is that nato is the most successful alliance in history for two reasons. Reason number one is that we have been loyal to our core value, our core task, ever since we were founded in 1949. And that is that we are an alliance we have promised to protect each other. One for all, all for one. If one allied is attacked, it triggers a response from the whole alliance. And this strength of the unity of the alliance has been the main reason why the alliance has been so successful. And the strength of nato is not aimed at provoking conflict, but the strength of nato is to prevent the conflict. And by delivering credible deterrence, we have been able for close to seven decades, 70 years, to be able to prevent conflict and armed aggression against any Nato Alliance country. That is a great success, especially in europe. Because in europe, we were fighting each other since the end of the Second World War, but since the foundation of nato there have been no more these conflicts, at least amongst nato allies in europe. No nato ally has been attacked. So, the unity, one for all, all for one, is the main reason why nato has been such a successful alliance. The other reason is that nato has been able to adapt to change. So when the world is changing, nato is changing. For almost 40 years, nato was focused on only one task that was to deter the soviet union from attacking western europe. Nato allied countries. And we were quite successful. The cold war ended without firing a single shot. And it ended in a peaceful way. The berlin wall came down and people started to ask whether nato was needed anymore. Nato eitheras that had to go out of business or out of area. And we did go out of area after the fall of the berlin wall, the end of the cold war. We helped end the ethnic wars in the balkans. We also helped fight terrorism in afghanistan. And we did Crisis Management beyond our borders. We did that from the beginning of the 1990s until today. But now, nato has to change again. Because we have to continue to manage crisis beyond our borders. In the northn, africa region. But at the same time, we have to come back to europe and focus once again on europe. And that is especially the case after the illegal annexation of crimea and the use of force against russias more assertive behavior, especially against ukraine. Therefore, nato is now implementing the biggest reinforcement to the collective thense since the end of cold war. We are fixing the response force. And were deploying forces both to the baltic countries and in the southeast of the alliance. So we are adapting, once again, to respond to a more challenging and difficult security environment. And again, the message is that we are investing in defense not to promote conflict but to prevent conflict. And therefore what we do is defensive. It is proportionate, and it is measured in a way that we dont want to provoke a new cold war, we dont want a new arms race and we continue to seek dialogue with russia. Based on the idea that there is no contradiction between strength and dialogue. We strongly believe that as long as nato is united, and as long as nato is firm and predictable, then we can and should engage in political dialogue with russia because russia is our neighbor. Russia is there to stay. We have to manage the relationship with russia in the best possible way because it is in both our and russias interests to defuse the tensions. To reduce tensions and find better ways to live together. This was the main issue i discussed with President Trump yesterday in the white house. And his security team. This will be the main issue. Were going to discuss when nato leaders meet in may in brussels. This is the main issue i hope to discuss with you in the coming hours. Think you so much. Im ready to take your questions. Thank you. [applause] mr. Volker thank you, secretary general. Thank you for those remarks. Again, my name is kurt volker, im the executive director of the Mccain Institute for international leadership, part of Arizona State university. And i am a proud alumnus of Elliott School even before it was called the Elliott School. Longer ago than i care to state publicly. It has been a great privilege to have gone here and to have had a career built on that. Secretary general, i will open up the questions and answers with you and then we will turn to the audience here to ask questions. A few at a time. I do want to give priority to students here at the Elliott School. So students, think about what you want to ask and get your hands up early. Secretary general, i want to start with the first question for you. We have heard from President Trump and this administration both during the course of the president ial campaign and since then, many things. Nato is obsolete, nato is not obsolete. Nato allies need to pay their share. We decide to defend them whether they pay their dues. When chancellor merkel was here, it was talked about how much germany owes the United States. Nato needs to reform. It needs to do with counterterrorism. We want to Work Together with russia. Russia is a threat. Russia intervened in our election just about everything you can imagine. You could chart this and say there has been a progression over time, a movement, and you have had a lot of interaction with the president. I know you have been on the phone with him and you had a meeting here with him in washington. You met with secretary mattice at the defense minister meeting. You met with Rex Tillerson and you met the Vice President on the security council. I want you, in your own words, where do you see the u. S. Administration on nato today . How do you characterize u. S. Policy, u. S. Support, u. S. Interest and concern . Mr. Stoltenberg the message underneath nato has been consistent. In all my interactions, in all our conversations and also with the president and Rex Tillerson and his whole team. The message has been all the time that they are strongly committed to nato. That they see the value, and they want to make sure that nato continues to adapt. And both the strong commitment to nato, which was reaffirmed yesterday in the meeting in the white house. The president also expressed to me a few days after he was elected on the phone. I welcome the message about commitment. I also welcome the message about how nato has to adapt. But President Trump and secretary mattis, underlined the importance that nato has to do more. I welcome that. When they stress the importance of fair burden sharing in nato, we need that. We need nato allies to invest more in defense. We have to remember that some ies declared theynia will meet the 2 target. Declared they will meet the 2 target next year. So nato is adapting. Nato is changing. We welcome the strong focus from other organizations on the need to continue. Mr. Volker very good. Do you believe that allies are responding to this call to spend more on defense . In case you didnt hear the answer, he said absolutely, they are going to 2 and beyond. [laughter] again, you have articulated the u. S. Support for nato. But part of the question for the u. S. Is, are the allies ready to support nato . Mr. Stoltenberg yes, we have turned a corner. What we have seen is that after many years of cuts in defense spending across europe and canada, we actually saw in 2016, we saw for the first time a significant increase in defense spending across europe and canada. And we saw an increase of 3. 8 . Or 10 billion u. S. Dollars. And that is a significant increase to the amount of money for defense. We still have a long way to go. And much remains. But at least the europeans have started to move in the right direction. As i said, some allies already meet the 2 guidelines. Declared they will be it this year or next year. It this year or next year. So what we discussed with the president yesterday was how we need to keep up the momentum so that we are able to continue. In 2014what we promised when he made a defense pledge, was to stop the cuts with gradual increases and move towards 2 over the decade. We have started to do that. And my top interest has been to spendingdefense because it is important for the support of the whole alliance. What we call the defense investment pledge is not only about spending. It is about spending more but also spending better. To be more efficient. To work closer together. And it is about to have the capabilities we need in nato and it is about the contributions to nato operations. Very often we speak about the pledge, about cash capabilities and contributions. All that is important at the same time. Mr. Volker in your remarks, you said nato wanted to deal with russia from a position of strength and to have deterrence in defense, but also to have dialogue to Work Together with russia. Does russia want to Work Together with nato . Mr. Stoltenberg yes and no. We see some areas where theyre willing to work and other areas where we see it is much more difficult to establish any kind of understanding or dialogue. But we have to continue to work for dialogue. Because the world is safer when russia and nato are able to speak, to talk, and to strengthen and improve our relationship. And it is hard to predict how the relationship between nato and russia will be in the future. But im absolutely certain that we have to do whatever we can to defuse the tension and to work to avoid a new cold war. So that as i we have the approach of russia with defense and dialogue. This is also something which is based on my own experience as a politician. Because norway, as you all know, is bordering russia to the north. We have a land border and we have a border in the sea. The continental shelf. Fishers, and so on. And in norway, we were able to workinga pragmatic, relationship with the soviet union during the cold war on issues like energy and border to sea, environment, fishery, and military issues where we had the search and rescue teams working together. We were in regular contact with the Russian Armed forces of the north. This cooperation in the north between norway, a nato ally, and russia, takes place not despite norways membership in nato but but because of norways relationship in nato. Our membership in nato provided the strengths and the platform to engage with russia. So i strongly believe that we should not be afraid to talk to the russians. They are there to stay. They are our biggest neighbor. And it will help all of us if we are able to improve the relationship with russia. Mr. Volker a final question from me than we are going to pick from the audience and students in particular. Did you and the president discuss ukraine and how does ukraine fit into the scenario of russia relations and giving ukraine a sense of security . Mr. Stoltenberg we discussed ukraine. Of course we are concerned about the situation in Eastern Ukraine. And the fact that russia illegally annexed a part of ukraine, crimea. It is the first time they have done it by force. This is big for ukraine and it underlines the relationship in europe. It has been so important for peace and stability in europe. So nato, the United States, nato allies, provide support to ukraine. We help them mobilize defense structures, to armed forces. Train them. Different trust funds for cyber and control. Nato and nato allies provide political and practical support to ukraine. At the same time, i think it is important to understand that it isnt only about ukraine. Because nato the main reason why we have implemented this is reinforcement is because of ukraine. So actually, the illegal annexation of crimea and the support of russia in Eastern Ukraine, the continued desegregation come is the main reason why nato has strength in a collective defense in europe, making sure that no allies y experience anything like what ukraine has experienced with russia since 2014. Mr. Volker for ukraine itself . Mr. Stoltenberg it is important for ukraine itself that we provide support. That we help them with mobilizing their armed forces. Fighting corruption. Helping them command control. Cyber, many areas where we work with ukraine. Training of ukrainian forces. But the way to solve the problem with the crisis in ukraine is through negotiations and political solution. The only basis for that is the minsk agreements. And we are calling on russia to use all of its influence on the separatists in Eastern Ukraine to make sure they respect the minsk agreement. That means respecting ceasefires, which are not respected now. Withdraw weapons from the contact lines and allow the International Service to do their work and observe the ceasefire, because that is a precondition for any effective implementation of the minsk agreement. Mr. Volker thank you. Students . Third row center. Given the current governments in poland and hungary, the election in france, as well as the german president s comments on warmongering, do you think there are internal threats to nato within its members . Mr. Stoltenberg mr. Volker were going to take a couple. To your left. Since the end of the cold war, what do you believe has been natos biggest mistakes have been in its interactions with russia, and also successes . Mr. Volker and we will stay in the center aisle now, the blue sweatshirt. Thank you for coming to speak here. I had a question in regards to how nato is going to respond in syria. At first, on internal threats and challenges. Remember inant to democracies there are different Political Parties and views. Country, many have been against nato the whole time. When i was young, i was also against nato. [laughter] thatt the reason i say is we should not be afraid of open debate or different opinions. Even if they are wrong. [laughter] but i think that is all part of it. So yes, Political Parties, organizations in nato countries which are critical towards nato as an intro to show in is just part of what we do. I am not afraid of that. Because i think that nato has itven again and again that is a strength that we have open andte and different views we are developing our thinking by confronting different views understandingour over difficult issues and topics and nato has proven again and again that despite differences, despite the fact we elect conservatives, liberals, people m many different republicans, democrats, different parties different views. They have always been able to , thatith natos core task we are stronger together that no alone in design as we stand together we prevent conflict. The best way is to send a message to a potential adversary so strong you should not try to attack one ally because all of our allies will be there. Coming from a strong small country like norway, the by havinge feel others supporting us is the reason why you can feel as safe as we do. Be afraid. D not there are different political tendencies, that is part of a Natural Development and debate in a democratic society. The next question was russia . The kindall, i am not of person who has a list of remembering my greatest mistakes. Laughter] every memory and work at them. But no, i am not able to point out one thing that was natos greatest mistake. Are a democracy. Sometimes it takes a long time to make decisions. Sometimes i would like a clear of to dohat has part with the fact that in a it is not democracy always the perfect solution but they are sustainable and strong because they are binding to the nations. I think the biggest success is the fact that we are united to prevent war. That we have been able to with the 12 or 16 members in the beginning, but because thers warsaw pact members have joined nato. We werele east fighting and fighting for centuries and then since the Second World War there has been no conflict at least in the nato countries attacking. Syria,e response to syria is a very difficult, dangerous, complex situation which affects nato very much because syria borders take ally. , which is a nato we participate in support the fight against isil. Based nato is on the ground in syria, but we have provided planes, we provide them with air pictures, but when it comes to the use of chemical weapons, that is totally unacceptable, it is horrendous, and it is violating international law. And those who are responsible must be held accountable for any use of chemical weapons. Therefore, the airstrikes against the Syrian Air Base a few days ago was a u. S. Operation, military operation, based on u. S. Intelligence, that it has received great understanding among nato allies because they understand it has to have a consequence when someone is using chemical weapons. Mr. Volker and what is next for nato in syria . Mr. Stoltenberg there has been no call for any nato presence on the ground in syria. Some nato allies are present there. The United States is there with special operations forces. U. K. Allies are there to fight isil. Turkey is also present in the northern part of syria. But that is part of the complexity of the situation in the syria and there have been no calls for the Nato Alliance to get involved in the conflict in syria. Mr. Volker very good. More questions. We will take this side of the room and we will do that side of the room. Over here, the third row in the middle, glasses and the tie. Good afternoon, mr. Secretary general. My question effects on your opening speech. In recent years we have seen changes in global security. The Cyber Attacks, the lone wolf attacks are challenges. My question, how will nato adjust itself to facing a new challenges in global security, and how will nato working with its members to fight against the Unconventional Warfare that a lot of the countries are facing recently. Thank you. Mr. Volker thank you very much. We will go to the front row. I am a student here at the school. What is the nato role now in libya since it has destabilized the country . Now it is basically stateless. Like, there are many militias fighting. Do you have any certain militia that will take her of the country or mr. Volker ok, and we have one further back. Lets go back on the lefthand side there. There you go. And wait for the microphone. Sorry, im making this easy for the microphone guys. Thank you for coming. My question is, how do you in and sure that countries and withinn within fund basically, so one is not paying more than mr. Volker countries paying according to their proportional size or wealth. Will size or wealth. Proportionality, libya, cleaning up our mess, and cyber. Modern threats and challenges. Mr. Stoltenberg first on whether it is cyber, hybrid, all these new threats, one thing we have to understand is before it was easy to distinguish whether it was peace or war, and nations declared war and were supposed will to say now it is war and now it is peace and the war was in a well defined geographic area. Now it is a more blurred line between peace and war, and it is hard to say exactly when the war against isil did start. And the wind will it end and what and what will it end debt and the where specifically does it take place. But it also takes place in the allied capitals where isil has attacked innocent civilians, and it takes place in cyberspace. And i guess it is much harder to say and we do not have an exact date for when it started and when it will end. So, the new threats are partly why the fact that it is a mixture of civilian and military means of aggression and a much more blurred line between peace and war. Nato has adapted to that, too. The forces, more intelligence, more surveillance, more early warning, all that is aimed at being able to respond to more hybrid threats, which is the phrase you use for those kinds of threats. And also the fact that we are stepping up when it comes to Cyber Defenses. We have declared that Cyber Defense from soviet Cyber Attacks can trigger article 5, which means we regard Cyber Attacks as serious or potentially as serious as a kinetic attack, and it will trigger article 5. We have air, sea, but now we have cyber as a military domain. We have done all the things helping allies in sharing and improving their Cyber Defenses. Nato can do more and we are constantly looking for much more we can do, but nato is adapting to these new kinds of threats. Sorry. Then libya. It is important libya was not a stable country when nato went in there. There was a civil war going on. And we implemented the u. N. Mandate, and we helped to stop the killing of civilians, which the gaddafi regime was responsible for. If there is anything we can learn from the libya operation is one thing is to implement the military operation as we did. But it is important to stabilize the country afterwards. Nato did not have a mandate, but the whole international community, including nato to the u. N. , the e. U. , have a responsibility for not being more present afterwards. And for me that underscores the message of that convention, and the importance of training local forces, enabling them to stabilize the country. So we are in dialogue with the Libyan Government or the government of National Accord on how nato can provide support to build defense institutions to help them stabilize their own country. It is not the easiest situation, but i think that is the best thing to do, to try to work with the u. N. Recognized group and help them stabilize their country. Then burden sharing or defense spending. In one way, it is a simple rule or guideline, and that is that every nato ally should spend or invest in defense 2 of gdp, and gdp reflects in a way the income or the wealth of the nation. Rich countries spend more than not so rich countries. And as long as they spend 2 , they have fair burden sharing. The problem is many allies spend less than 2 of gdp, so, therefore, a way to obtain a more balanced burden sharing is make sure that all spend 2 or perhaps even more. And that is exactly what i have been focusing on. That is exactly what has been the main message from President Trump. But that is a very bipartisan message from the United States. Canada and those european allies who spend less have to increase defense spending. We have started. We have a long way to go. But we have started in the right direction. Mr. Volker we will take it from the side of the room now, second row now, woman in the gray sweater. We are seeing the Largest Military buildup since the 1950s. How is the alliance interpreting russias actions . Mr. Volker the military buildup, in russia . Yes. Mr. Volker the gentleman with the beard, back row . Following the coup in turkey among their own staff on nato so how does this affect nato daily operations and how does respond to human rights abuses in Member States . Thank you so much, mr. Secretary general. In your earlier remarks you mentioned natos greatest strength is it is able to determine with credibility. And given the actions of russia in crimea in 2014, which you referred to earlier, how will nato reassert their credibility in europe and in what ways should the United States also take action to reassert their credibility within the native nato organization . Thank you so much. Mr. Volker great. Thank you very much. Over to you, secretarygeneral. Russias military buildup, restoring credibility, and the situation of military officers assigned to nato billets being called home after the coup. Mr. Stoltenberg we have seen a significant military buildup in russia over many years. Since 2000, they have approximately tripled defense spending. But not only spending more, but also they have developed new and more modern equipment. They are exercising more, and they are having more aggressive patterns of exercises. They have also exercised nuclear and conventional forces. They have a rhetoric which is aimed at intimidating neighbors. And most important, they have been willing to use force against georgia in 2008, against ukraine in 2014, and they continue to use military personnel to support and destabilize Eastern Ukraine. And after that, they also are active in the cyber, hybrid threats, and actions against nato allied countries. So this is the reason why nato has adapted. This is the reason why after many years after reducing defense spending we have started increasing defense spending and have deployed forces to the eastern part of the alliance. Having said that, it is extremely important that we do not overdo it or overreact, because if we end up with a new arms race, a new cold war, we are risking just increased tensions even further, but decreasing our security. That is the reason why nato has been focused on what to do on on its proportion and continue to work for a political dialogue with russia. Then turkey. It is great that they recalled staff from the nato command structure after the coup attempt. This affects the nato activities because they have replaced them. I have underlined that turkey has the right to protect itself. They have suffered terrorist attacks. Attempt. A failed coup the walls of the National Assembly have been bombed in ankara, and it was impressive to see the damaged building, and the parliament was bombed when parliamentarians were inside the building. Hundreds of people were killed. And of course, those behind this failed coup must be held responsible. The important thing is this is done in accordance with the rule of law. And this is something i have raised in ankara several times because the rule of law is important when you have these kinds of processes after a failed coup attempt. Then defense. Russia used military force against ukraine. But it is important not to mix that with nato deterrence, because nato deterrence is about deterring any adversary from attacking a natoallied country. There have been no attacks to nato countries since it was established. We of course condemn that use of military force against ukraine regardless of whether ukraine is a nato member or not because it violated international law, violating the sovereignty and territorial integrity of ukraine. We have made sure that it continues to be credible by deploying forces especially in the eastern part of the land. Mr. Volker we will start to wrap up a little bit. I would like to engage in a dialogue about a couple of things. One of them, i am not as forgetful as the secretary general because i think of nato mistakes. [laughter] mr. Volker one that is current is i think nato was a little slow to recognize that russia had changed. It was not the rush of the 1990s we were dealing with anymore. We were seeing a military buildup, aggressive behavior, the pressure on georgia, and nato was still playing by the old book. And i think nato has adapted. I think the decision at the summit, their European Reassurance Initiative from the United States, i think this has compensated for that tremendously. But i think we were slow. Maybe that is the way democracies behave. Democracies naturally do not want to go there unless they absolutely have to. On the other side of that, i think the greatest thing that nato has done, at least in the last 25 years, keeping the peace is the obvious one, but the other thing that nato has done is to inspire countries to reform, to become democracies, market economies, establish the rule of law, particular in right, and to then allow them to join with other countries to share that Common Security in a wider area. This is often referred to as nato enlargement. But i think even that terminology gets it wrong, because what it really is is about widening a space of prosperity in europe. We had here the ambassador of natos next ally, montenegro, the document signed here by President Trump, and we have the ambassador of georgia is here. The ambassador of estonia is here. They joined nato in the prague enlargement round. It is one of the great achievements of nato, and if it is, where do we go from here on the process of inspiring that kind of reform and seeing more countries become part of that democratic and secure community . Mr. Stoltenberg i agree with you. I mentioned preserving the peace. But of course, the fact that so many more countries are now part of a family of democratic nations, being a member of nato, and or the European Union has really helped to promote stability, peace, prosperity in europe. And nato enlargement is very much a part of that. So i agree. Second, nato is continuing to expand, meaning that we will soon have montenegro as our 29th member. The United States has finished the application process. So it only remains in the accession protocol to be completed in the netherlands and spain, i think it is, and then we hope to see montenegro a full member in june. Then we are working with georgia. Georgia is implementing impressive reforms, strengthening their democratic institutions, modernizing their defense institutional structures, and fighting and all of this is part at least because of the aspirations to join nato. I always underlined that to implement that kind of reforms is good because you move closer to nato. Even if their aim is not to be closer to nato, they should find direction and strengthen democratic institutions. There is a double reason to do it in a country like georgia, which is aiming for nato membership. And we should support them. Nato supports them with this reform process. So natos door is open and we will continue to stress the message that the enlargement or whether nato is going to have more members, it is up to the applicant country to decide and the 28 countries that are members. No one else does not have a right to intervene that they do not have a right to be accepted. Mr. Volker please join me in thanking the secretarygeneral. [applause] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2017] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] [indiscernible conversation] [indiscernible conversations] announcer High School Students from around the country were in washington last month for the united date senate youth program. Next we hear from some of the art pence on q a. Britishreview of element and then the former pakistani president talks about the current state of affairs. Announcer tonight on q a, a discussion with High School Students attending the annual weeklong United States senate youth program. Students talked about their interest in government and politics and shares my shared some highlights from their visit to washington, d. C. Brian give us your name and where you are from. I am Aaron Sullivan from abingdon, virginia. Brian what brought you to washington during this last week . I came here to learn about Public Service and meet all sorts of people like the chief justice of the supreme court, some senators, the president Vice President of the United States