Dr. Urban Rusnák, Secretary General of the Energy Charter Secretariat, gave a special lecture at Energy Security class

On 17 November 2014, Dr. Urban Rusnák, Secretary General of the Energy Charter Secretariat, gave a lecture entitled “Energy Charter: Origins and Future Potential.” The lecture was held at the Energy Security class of Prof. Nobuo Tanaka, who was recently appointed as his Special Envoy.

Dr. Rusnák first referred to the current crisis in Ukraine and the role played by the Energy Charter Secretariat through an Energy Security contact group with the EU, Russia and Ukraine (Link). He then explained the evolution of the Energy Charter Process with a particular emphasis in the current modernization, which includes (i) the introduction of the political Chairmanship of the Conference (Japan will held the Chairmanship in 2016), (ii) the de-restriction of the Conference decisions and (iii) the updating of the 1991 political declaration. He continued by emphasizing that following the fourth round of negotiations (with around 100 states involved), the parties have now finalised the text of a new political declaration: the International Energy Charter (PDF, 200KB), which will be adopted and signed at a Ministerial conference in The Hague in May 2015. He finally explained the uniqueness of the Energy Charter Conference in the global energy architecture in relation to other international organisations, as well as the interest of countries like China (Link).

The 30-minute Q&A that followed was filled with several questions and comments from the students followed by an explanation from Dr. Rusnák about possible internships at the Energy Charter Secretariat (Link). He also mentioned that the Secretariat is willing to have closer relations with the Japanese academic institutions.