Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Ambassador Yrjölä, for your timely report. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has fundamentally impacted the OSCE and undermined Euro-Atlantic security. Over the last two years, there has also been a reversal of a falling trend in fatalities from armed conflict globally, as highlighted by the UN Secretary General. Against this backdrop, it is more important than ever that the OSCE conflict cycle instruments are robust to deal with contemporary security challenges.

Ambassador, today is an opportunity to reflect and take stock of our work to promote comprehensive security. Prior to its invasion, Russia blocked the mandate renewals of the Border Observer Mission, the Special Monitoring Mission, and the Project Co-ordinator in Ukraine.  Russia lied about its unprecedented military buildup on the borders of Ukraine and refused to engage in good faith in the Renewed European Security Dialogue.  And since the 24 February, Russia, enabled by Belarus, has brought a new wave of indefensible suffering on the Ukrainian people across land, air, sea, and cyberspace. It has tried to change the status of Ukrainian territory through attempted annexation and sham referenda. And throughout, Russia continues to lie about it, week-in-week-out, right here in this room.

At the same time, Russia continues to undermine Georgia’s sovereignty and violate its territorial integrity by recognising the so-called independence of Georgia’s Abkhazia and South Ossetia regions and its attempted borderisation tactics. In Moldova, Russian forces and munitions remain present without the consent of the Moldovan government. We continue to support efforts to ensure peaceful resolutions to the conflicts in Georgia and Moldova.

The Conflict Prevention Centre (CPC), as the OSCE ‘nerve cell’, plays a vital role in responding to these situations, through its international reporting, early warning, dialogue facilitation, mediation, rehabilitation, and programme management. It continues to strengthen the security of States and wider regions through its support to the field missions, their host countries, and Special Representatives, as well as here in Vienna by providing invaluable support to the FSC.

We remain grateful to the Secretary General for her decisive action in providing early warning to the Permanent Council in February on the situation in Ukraine. Early warning is a vital tool to get right, and as the OSCE-wide Focal Point, we rely on CPC for its analysis in this space.

Thank you to all those involved for the important work in evacuating international mission members from the Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine (SMM) and supporting the relocation of national mission members to safer locations within the country in February. We call on Russia for the immediate release of our OSCE colleagues currently in detention in Donetsk and Luhansk.

We agree that conventional arms control and confidence building measures remain crucial. The Belarusian authorities’ obfuscation and Russia’s refusal to engage with the two invocations of the Vienna Document Chapter three mechanism was an important early warning signal. We share your concerns about the impact of recent military escalation between Armenia and Azerbaijan, and recognize the quick deployment of a ‘needs assessment’ to establish the facts and gather verified information in the conflict-affected areas.

We welcome the various tools being utilised in response to the crisis in Afghanistan, where OSCE activities can help to address vulnerabilities and support connectivity and development for the region.

We also welcome the role field missions play in facilitating dialogue to address the escalation of tensions in border areas.

In each of these cases, we have been pleased to see an inclusive, holistic and gender-sensitive approach adopted. Inclusivity and the role of women in particular must be mainstreamed into both the informal and formal aspects of peace processes, enabling an environment for women to be able to speak up for their rights, their communities, and their futures.

Ambassador, your report is a helpful reminder that we have a set of tools available to de-escalate and build trust. And while these tools can constantly be strengthened, we must recognise that all the available resources can only be as effective as we – States – allow them to be. We must demonstrate the political will to use OSCE and other resources and to fully implement the principles and commitments that underpin comprehensive security.

I join others in thanking you and your team for your ongoing support to each OSCE State facing a current conflict situation. The coming year will be no less challenging and will require our renewed commitment to conflict-prevention, securing and sustaining peace. Thank you.

Alan Peterson, from Liverpool, was sole director of Sage Media National Limited. The company began trading from January 2018 and had a contract to produce and distribute a magazine titled ‘Copperwheel’ on behalf of the West Midlands Police Motor Club.

The magazine was published twice a year and Sage Media National Limited would cold call businesses to sell advertising in the magazine.

Concerns, however, were raised about the advertising sales techniques used by Sage Media National Limited before the Insolvency Service launched confidential enquiries into the publisher’s activities.

Following a petition by the Insolvency Service, the courts wound-up Sage Media National Limited in November 2020 and appointed the Official Receiver as Liquidator. Further investigations uncovered that Alan Peterson caused the magazine publisher to carry out substantial misconduct.

Sage Media National Limited consistently misinformed and abused their clients. The magazine publisher used aggressive sales techniques, invoiced clients for advertising services they did not order, deluded clients into thinking the magazine had a substantial subscription list, and misled clients by suggesting it was affiliated with the emergency services.

One charity, having agreed to a single advert, was invoiced for two further adverts they had not agreed to, and the invoice was paid from a volunteer’s personal funds.

Through these duplicitous activities, Sage Media National Limited secured £74,000 from clients for advertisements that it failed to publish in specified editions of a magazine or at all.

The magazine publisher also failed to maintain and/or preserve and/or deliver up adequate accounting records. This has meant that the Official Receiver has been unable to establish the legitimacy of several of the company’s activities, including why more than £32,000 was transferred to Alan Peterson’s personal account.

In June 2022, the Secretary of State accepted a 11-year disqualification undertaking from Alan Peterson, after he did not dispute that he caused Sage Media National Limited to act with a lack of commercial probity.

Alan Peterson is banned from directly, or indirectly, becoming involved in the promotion, formation or management of a company, without the permission of the court.

Karen Maxwell, Deputy Chief Investigator for the Insolvency Service, said:

Sage Media National Limited unscrupulously targeted companies using aggressive sales tactics to advertise in a magazine that didn’t have the reach or associations that it falsely claimed to have. As sole director of the magazine publisher, Alan Peterson was ultimately responsible for the company’s objectionable tactics and abusing clients of thousands of pounds.

11 years is a substantial ban and Alan Peterson has rightly been removed from the corporate arena for a significant amount of time. From petitioning the courts to wind-up the company, through to securing Alan Peterson’s disqualification, this case clearly demonstrates the full abilities of the Insolvency Service to tackle serious financial misconduct.

Alan Peterson is from Liverpool and his date of birth is November 1962.

Sage Media National Limited Limited (Company number 11176202)

Disqualification undertakings are the administrative equivalent of a disqualification order but do not involve court proceedings. Persons subject to a disqualification order are bound by a range of restrictions.

Further information about the work of the Insolvency Service, and how to complain about financial misconduct.

You can also follow the Insolvency Service on:

• UK Armed Forces to receive crucial protection system against improvised explosive devices
• £45 million contract supports British Defence industry
• Project supports cutting edge UK skills and capability development, laying the foundation for long term growth

Soldiers, vehicles and UK military bases around the world will receive innovative digital protection against remote and radio controlled Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) through a £45 million contract with British industry.

Under the contract awarded to Team Protect, the work – called Project CRENIC – sees UK military experts collaborate with small and medium businesses during the next five years.

Team Protect compromises of PA Consulting, Leonardo, Leidos Innovations UK, and Marshall Land Systems. This contract will sustain more than 50 jobs around the country, including in the North-West, East and South-West of England. The project aims to support and create further jobs through contracts with small and medium enterprises.

The project will develop equipment designed to be carried by soldiers, fitted to vehicles and protect military bases by detecting and disrupting explosive devices using advanced techniques across the electromagnetic spectrum.

Defence Procurement Minister Alex Chalk said:

Our Armed Forces dedicate their lives to protecting and securing our nation. As the technology used by our adversaries to threaten our people and operations evolves, we are innovating to stay ahead of the challenge.

This project brings together pioneering UK technology and industry to create a world leading protection system for our Armed Forces.

The new system will be supported by the Defence Cyber and Electromagnetic Activities (CEMA) Architecture, which uses a common set of hardware and software open technology standards, equivalent to desktop computers and cellular phone software, to allow for wider industry participation and support reconfiguration for other military uses. This will allow the Armed Forces to modify the solutions in the future and allow for greater collaboration with allies.

Major General Robin Anderton-Brown, Director Capability Strategic Command, said:

Incorporating cutting-edge technology and adopting an agile acquisition approach, CRENIC will deliver a world-leading capability to protect our forces deployed on global operations.

Using the Defence CEMA Architecture, Project CRENIC will enable information to be shared across multiple domains, making it the first capability to directly support Multi-Domain Integration. This means information only needs to be collected once and can then be used many times. The project is expected to support electronic warfare in the future, including countering remotely piloted air systems.

On behalf of Team Protect, Peter Lovell, Global Head of Defence and Security at PA Consulting said:

We are delighted that Team Protect has been selected to be the System Integrator (SI) for this project. The work marks a strong progression of the collaborative approach between industry and the Ministry of Defence to deliver innovative solutions to keep UK forces safe.

The team has deep and extensive experience across vital capabilities, including complex programme delivery, engineering, agile software development, and digital transformation. We will deliver this project and keep UK forces safer by leveraging our relative strengths – using ingenuity to help deliver a positive human future.

A cutting-edge integration laboratory facility will also be established to support the development of the system. The laboratory will promote innovation and experimentation as the new capability evolves against emerging threats.

First deliveries of the new equipment for vehicle and soldier carried systems for use on operations are due to take place in 2026. Equipment will be incrementally deployed and will evolve to meet the needs of the British Army, Royal Marines and Royal Air Force land forces long into the future.

Veterans UK is responsible for administering compensation and pensions schemes for both serving personnel, veterans and their families, as well as the Veterans Welfare and Defence Transition Services. However, did you know that Veterans UK is part of the Ministry of Defence’s shared services delivery organisation, Defence Business Services?

As well our veterans services, in DBS we also look after Pay, HR, and lots more in-between for the Armed Forces Community. So, chances are that if you have served even one day in the UK Armed Forces, you will have used the services of DBS.

In Veterans UK we know that we can continuously improve how we provide our services and make your experience of Veterans UK and DBS a better one. We can’t do that without listening to the people that have or could use our services, and better understand what we can do to help you.

We have taken the results of our DBS Veterans Customer Satisfaction Survey and alongside those, invited many members of the armed forces and veterans communities, and their advocates, to ‘Lived Experience’ events, where senior leaders and staff from Veterans UK have listened to feedback and suggestions on what they need from us directly from veterans and supporting organisations.

We are committed to enhancing our services where we can and playing our part to deliver on the Government’s Veterans’ Strategy Action Plan 2022/24 and we have been working hard to address some of the key points raised through the feedback we have received as part of our promise to continuously improve.

Our end users told us that they want and need more information about how the compensation scheme claim and appeals processes work.

Our first step has been to produce a comprehensive suite of diagrams that illustrate the flow of a claim or an appeal, and what happens as the application is considered and processed. The diagrams show what information is needed to accurately consider an application and where we get that from, in order to ensure that claimants receive what they are eligible for and entitled to, in accordance with legislation.

We want to be transparent and by sharing what we do with each of the claims, we hope that we can work together, with our end users, to ensure their claims are dealt with quickly and accurately.

Armed Forces Compensation Scheme: claims and appeals – Customer Journey Maps

As part of Veterans UK’s continued commitment to enhancing our services, we have also produced a similar suite of diagrams to help customers with the Armed Forces Pension Scheme (AFPS). These maps will illustrate the flow of various processes within the scheme, such as Early Payment of Preserved Pension (EPPP) and Internal Dispute Resolution Procedure (IDRP), so that customers can see the end-to-end process regarding their Armed Forces Pension.

Armed Forces Pension Scheme – Customer Journey Maps

We are also modernising our services and looking forward to providing more digitally enabled ways for individuals and their representatives to make a claim, monitor its progress, and stay in touch with us. We will keep you informed of these improvements as they develop, via this and other channels. You can also follow us on Facebook@modveteransuk and Twitter VeteransUK_MOD.