High Level Course – Session 2020-2021

From 28 September until 02 October, the first module of the sixteenth session of the CSDP High Level Course took place. This yearly course is organised under the auspices of the European Security and Defence College (ESDC) and consists of four modules each year, the first always being organised by the Department High Studies of Defence of the Royal Higher Institute for Defence, in close cooperation with the Egmont Institute, on the Campus Renaissance.

This session is named after the Belgian politician Jean Rey (1902-1983) who served as the second President of the European Commission (1967-1970) and as a member of the first directly elected European Parliament in 1979.

This year, Covid-19 made the organisation more complex. Nevertheless more than 80% of the 63 selected participants attended in person the whole module. Several high authorities, such as General Claudio GRAZIANO (Chairman of the EU Military Committee – EUMC), Charles FRIES (Deputy Secretary General of the EEAS for CSDP and Crisis response), Ambassador Sofie FROM-EMMESBERGER (Chair of the Political and Security Committee – PSC) and Ambassador Thomas OSSOWSKI (Permanent representative of Germany – currently assuming EU presidency – to the PSC) made this week as interesting as ever.

The next modules will take place in January (in Madrid), April (in Paris), and in June (in Athens).