From July 1 to July 7, 2024, the 12th round of Warsaw Euro-Atlantic Summer Academy (WEASA) was held. This year, the theme of the meeting was Euro-Atlantic relations and integration at the time of crisis.
WEASA is a series of lectures, workshops and meetings with experts that are addressed to people coming from countries of the Eastern Partnership and (since 2017) Western Balkans. Analysts, political and government advisors, think tank and NGO employees, civil servants and journalists are invited to attend the Academy. Since 2017, one of the main themes of WEASA have been issues related to new technologies and their impact on human lives, society, and politics. Since 2022, due to the full-scale Russian war against Ukraine, also the issues of security and geopolitics have been discussed at the Academy.
This year, 36 participants, including four facilitators of the group of Academy alumni, selected out of 360 applicants from all the countries to which the Academy is addressed have participated.
The special guest at WEASA was Petras Auštrevičius, a member of the European Parliament representing Renew Europe political group, who gave the opening lecture on “How to revitalize Euro-Atlantic integration in difficult times?”.
The Academy participants discussed such issues as the condition of integration and their countries relations with the European Union, war in Ukraine and its impact on security in the Region, and changes taking place in NATO as a result of new challenges. The special element of this-year’s Academy were discussions on Poland’s experiences on the way to NATO and EU membership.
The WEASA participants also prepared presentations summing up the current political and social situation in their countries, as well as took place in the Oxford-style debate on “The next bing bang of EU enlargement should take place in 2030”.
The program was supplemented with workshops on counteracting disinformation and personal digital security.
WEASA is a joint initiative of Polish-American Freedom Foundation, the College of Europe, and the German Marshall Fund of the United States. Twelve WEASA rounds (from 2013 to 2024), have been attended by a total of 522 participants from the Eastern Partnership countries (and Western Balkans since 2017), including: 51 people from Armenia, 38 from Azerbaijan, 47 from Belarus, 92 from Georgia, 45 from Moldova, and 144 from Ukraine.
