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From: C-afp@clari.net (AFP)
Newsgroups: clari.world.europe.central,clari.world.organizations.misc,clari.world.europe,clari.world.organizations
Subject: March 12 set NATO entry date for Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic
Organization: Copyright 1999 by Agence France-Presse (via ClariNet)
Message-ID: <Qus-nato-eeuropeURHSz_9FH@clari.net>
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Date: Wed, 17 Feb 1999 8:16:54 PST
ACategory: usa
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   WASHINGTON, Feb 17 (AFP) - The United States has invited the  
foreign ministers of the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland to a 
March 12 ceremony to mark the accession of their countries into 
NATO, the State Department said Wednesday. 
   The ceremony is to be held at the Truman Presidential Library in  
Independence, Missouri. Harry Truman was president when the North 
Atlantic Treaty Organization was founded in 1949. 
   The United States is the legal depository for the Washington  
Treaty which created the North Atlantic Alliance. 
   The three countries will become full NATO members when they  
present their instruments of accession to US Secretary of State 
Madeleine Albright at the ceremony, the State Department said in a 
statement. 
   Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic are to be the first  
former Warsaw Pact nations to join NATO, which celebrates its 50th 
anniversary in April. 
   The presidents of the three countries are expected to sign NATO  
entry documents later this month ahead of the March 12 ceremony in 
Missouri. 
  	   	

