North American Defense Leaders Agree on Need for Cooperation

DoD News, Defense Media Activity

WASHINGTON, May 23, 2017 — Defense Secretary Jim Mattis hosted the third North American Defense Ministerial meeting yesterday with Canadian Defense Minster of Harjit Sajjan, Mexican Defense Secretary Gen. Salvador Cienfuegos, and Adm. Vidal Soberón, secretary of the Mexican navy.

The NADM is the defense component of North American regional cooperation efforts, chief Pentagon spokesperson Dana W. White said in a statement released today.

White also noted that Mattis also hosted bilateral meetings with the two nations’ defense leaders.

Importance of Community, Cooperation

“The secretaries and minister concurred on the importance of the North American community and continued cooperation and friendship as an example to the international community, to address the common and borderless challenges facing our region, and to advance the security of our people,” White said. They also recognized that North America, as a community, has global responsibilities and that complex challenges are best addressed by cooperative responses, she added.

The NADM provides a potential framework for cooperation and coordination among North America’s defense institutions to build a common understanding of threats and approaches to address these threats and to identify and implement initiatives to promote trilateral defense cooperation, White said.

The North American defense leaders decided to strengthen U.S., Canadian, and Mexican defense cooperation, advance the capability of the North American community to address mutually identified hemispheric defense challenges cooperatively, expand trilateral support and cooperation for multilateral regional defense institutions, and exchange lessons learned and best practices for peacekeeping activities, White said.