CMDR COE turns 5!

Dear CMDR Community, 

Since its accreditation as the 21^st NATO`s Centre of Excellence in 2015, the CMDR COE has been incessantly improving its capacity to serve as a hub of crisis management and disaster response expertise within a cooperative Community of Interest in support of NATO’s adaptive transformation. Our 2019 Quality Assurance certified by NATO SACT has brought us pride in our progress yet made us ever more cognisant of the responsibility for setting and upholding ever higher standards of performance and achievements. 

The CMDR COE’s area of responsibility, clearly seen through the lens of the complexity of the present security environment, and the absolute necessity of as comprehensive as possible an approach to tackling challenges, is of critical importance for the Alliance, also forming part of its strategic core tasks. The CMDR COE has solidified its position as a constructive partner and as a valuable tool for enhancing civilian and military CMDR capabilities within NATO, Allies’, and Partners’ crisis management systems.

During these 5 years, the Centre has generated a wealth of information, has identified lessons-learned, and recorded and shared good practices in an ever increasing effort of improving interoperability and strengthening collaborative partnerships among key CMDR stakeholders. Likewise, the CMDR COE has participated in, hosted, organised, and co-organised an array of events among which its resident courses; workshops; seminars, and conferences. The CMDR COE staff members are continuously building their personal expertise so as to be in a position to confidently share it within our Community of Interest.

Inter alia, the CMDR COE’s Education & Training initiatives on resilience; on gender mainstreaming; on climate change; the research products on mass migration, gender equality, and climate change are indicative of the CMDR COE’s understanding of the importance of cross-cutting matters within a framework of a comprehensive approach to peace and security. The Centre also successfully capitalises on modern technology having a fully operational modelling and simulation (M&S) laboratory. 

Through its Annual Conference on Interagency Interaction, the CMDR COE nurtures collaborative partnerships premised on good practices and constructive exchange.

We are continuously improving our resident course and developing new training solutions, including recently launching our Advanced Distributed Learning platform with courses already open for registration. Our mobile training teams have been involved in a number of exercises and trainings in different countries. We are serving as a Discipline leader in CSDP training for discipline Military Contribution to EU Disaster Response, Humanitarian Assistance and Civil Preparedness.

Over the years, the Centre has established close cooperation within NATO and the EU, noteworthy with the Supreme Allied Command Transformation, SHAPE, the Euro-Atlantic Disaster Response Coordination Centre (EADRCC), the Allied Joint Force Command - Naples, the European Commission's Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection Department (ECHO), and with other relevant stakeholders such as the US European Command, the George Marshall Centre, US Federal Emergency Management Agency. 

With the unwavering support of our Framework and Sponsoring Nations, we stand ready to meet challenges and seize opportunities which to take us ahead on our mission to contribute to shaping better, more inclusive and integrated CMDR.

I would like to thank all CMDR COE staff members - former and present, for their enthusiasm, determination and zeal in pursuing the vision of our Centre, and to wish them continuous success in all our future endeavours. 

Congratulations!

Col. Orlin Nikolov

CMDR COE Director