thank you very much distinguished chairman members of the commission i want to thank you for calling this important hearing and for providing us an opportunity to participate in this exchange on engagement of the organization for security and cooperation  europe with with our mediterranean partners i also welcome the interest of our partners in participating in this forum with members of the united states congress on an issue that is vital to many of our shared interests  mediterranean chapter emphasizing the close links between the security of europe and the security in the mediterranean region this security link has been underscored in subsequent document such as the  ninety nine charter for european security and the two thousand and three strategy to address threats to security and stability in the twenty first century participating states have committed themselves to exploring new avenues of cooperation and interaction as well as to explaining the scope of broad exchanges on norms principles and commitment through ongoing dialogue and joint activities with the mediterranean partners us has successfully shared its unique comprehensive three dimensional approach security with american mediterranean partners on a number of topics including confidence and security building measures  platform for dialogue and fostering of norms of behavior the twenty first century security and stability protecting human rights and fundamental freedoms as well as linkages between the exchange views and contribute to further development the relationship between the and the mediterranean part of the conferences are also attended by international organizations parliament academics and importantly n g o s leading to a unique cross fertilisation of ideas and recommendations in fact a number of very interesting recommendations came out of the two thousand and eight conference in amman jordan including suggestions to promote closer involvement of civil society in counter counterterrorism efforts to address climate change and desertification through regional cooperation and to support the creation of civil society networks in the mediterranean region united states is very interested in following up on these and other recommendations mediterranean partners have many opportunities to get involved in the work of the sea in addition to attending and participating in a wide range of meetings and conferences they are also invited to send observers to electoral missions of the office for democratic institutions and human rights who have received training in warsaw to  thank partnership we now have increased opportunities for conducting joint projects united states already has has used this fund support to project and hope to be able to contribute to more in the future we are particularly encouraged by a lively discussion at the june two thousand and nine workshop conducted in on the topic of media this workshop which was based on a suggestion made by egypt brought and work together to foster security and stability in our country the united states is interested in increasing cooperation with the mediterranean partners in all three mentions and hearing mediterranean perspectives on broader issues as well we sincerely look forward to engaging with our partners on issues such as their approach to the reintegration of iraq into the community of nations and to ways to resolve tensions over oil and gas supply and the demand and demand issues in eastern europe the mediterranean partner countries are at the crossroads of europe africa and the middle east their historical and existing ties with other partners have played a positive role in both the regional and the world arena and have the potential to make an even greater contribution we believe the onset of a new u s administration offers a new chance to engage in the  partnership and to intensify and reinforce our relationships in this critical area the obama administration has shown his willingness to listen and to think critically about the united states foreign policy priorities and objective start to the new to ministrations engagement with the mediterranean secretary clinton met with the foreign ministers of algeria morocco and tunisia and others on the margins of the gaza reconstruction conference  support we continue to look for opportunities north african partners bilaterally and regionally on a wide range of issues including migration terrorism economic cooperation and regional security in doing this we are committed to working with the mediterranean partners as well as other multilateral multilateral or arrangement to ensure that our efforts with the countries of the region are consistent and mutually  reinforcing partnering artists participating states in the mediterranean partners should work together productively to confront the challenges and promote security stability and individual freedom throughout the region and throughout the world lebanon on the lingering effects of the takeover by a mosque of gaza and the ability to reengage on some peer to peer level between the palestinians the israelis this organization is dedicated to human rights dedicated to democracy that represent their people function under the rule of law and for their people so it's a particular prostration when i look throughout north africa and around the love on that there's more work to do there than in the countries that we presently are engaged with your point was very good and i think i think you're absolutely right we cannot bring  it wouldn't be where we are putting so much of our energy but having said that how can this organization bring parent groups on a consistent basis into a relationship where they can see how the rest of our system works and not studied from the outside even though they can't be full members on the inside at the present time what would you suggest that we begin exploring if we're going to work with you as partner their neighbors jordan other arab states as you know i'm sure you're aware tunisia has always been very active in the process as has morocco so they're i'm not sure i would be as diplomatic as you they've always insisted on having a is doing a good job of shuttle diplomacy and that's usually how it works is you go to morocco you go to israel you go back to iraq and so on is there a better dynamic to bring the parties together in some sort of a forum where  staff and the wherewithal to potentially go anywhere in europe the mediterranean and put together something which might bring parties together that that up until now will only come together at a summit and it's you know all too are only after you've agreed to something that isn't going to probably accomplish anything but you've agreed to it so you'll sign it and the hope is we get people together for the dialogue thank you thank you very much thank you very much poverty and resentful directing resentment against the elites as well as in the face of the migrants of the different which is seen as the agent of do training and development with younger people i want to focus on something that the moroccan delegation to the circulated a vision paper talking about the need to engage around the issue of energy and water i represent a district right on lake michigan and of course the great lakes contain twenty percent of the world's first water and lake michigan in which my district is the only lake that's totally and completely contained within the united states and so therefore we have three hundred twenty industries that relate to water development we have a university that has an industry educational and academic system that is developed around water resources the impact of climate change and the lack of water on earth is going to have a greater impact on women and anyone else as they seek to relocate their families and so i am wondering what we could do an establishing a network among these mediterranean research institutions to work on a dual track to work on climate change and water development but also have that be a way of bringing women who are going to endure the greatest hardship under the dearth of these resources into these academic opportunities issues with including them the whole the whole economy of the country will suffer women are going to be greatly impacted by climate change and in water resources we need to get them involved in education and i think if we could get our mediterranean partners to see it as an economic issue it would help us deal with some of the