The Center for Eastern Studies, in cooperation with the partner institutes of the Think Visegrad consortium, organized a meeting of experts and journalists dedicated to the Visegrad cooperation. The Central European Expert Forum, held on April 21 in Zakopane, was a professional event accompanying the Polish Presidency of the Visegrad Group.
The State Secretary for EU affairs at the Prime Minister's Office of Hungary Szabolc Takács, Chief Economist at the Office of the Government of the Czech Republic, Aleš Chmelař, Head of the Task Force – EU future at the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs of the Slovak Republic Erik Liptak and the Director of the Polish Institute of International Affairs (PISM) Sławomir Dębski took part in the first thematic session devoted to Central European views on the future of the EU. The session was led by OSW Director Adam Eberhardt.
Tomasz Szatkowski, Under-Secretary of State at the Ministry of National Defence, spoke about the security situation in Central Europe and Polish security and defence. He also answered the questions of the participants.
A separate thematic session was devoted to the challenges of the Visegrad Group's communication strategy and public diplomacy. Tomáš Strážay from the Slovak Foreign Policy Association, Michal Kořan from the Institute of International Relations in Prague, András Rácz from the Center for Euro-Atlantic Integration and Democracy (CEID) in Budapest and Jakub Groszkowski, Head of the Central European OSW Group, introduced the discussion. The session was hosted by Maria Staszkiewicz from Aspen Institute Central Europe in Prague.
Prof. Jan Rychlík of Charles University in Prague delivered a special lecture entitled "Crossing Central Europe's borders in recent history".
On the occasion of the conference in Zakopane which was co-funded by International Visegrad Fund there was also a regular meeting of the national coordinators of the Think Visegrad platform. The Polish Institute of International Affairs (PISM) was invited to the "core network" of the consortium.
