New meeting, same challenges
On 1 September 2024, the Committee of Military Archives met in Lisbon during the XLIX Congress of Military History organised by the Portuguese Commission of Military History from 1 to 6 September 2024 with the main theme “Military interventions and political transition: From the 18th Century to the present”.
The meeting took place in Lagoas Park Hotel with the presence of ten delegates and friends of the Committee of Military Archives.
Initially, H.E. Ambassador Professor Dumitru Preda gave an introduction speech recalling his experience as founder member of the small Committee of Military Archives and the efforts the founders gave in the community to enlarge the knowledge in the field of the archives. Ambassador Preda concluded his intervention thanking the CAM for the job done and asking the Committee to continue working in the same direction for the benefit of the community.
After a short presentation of the persons around the table, our colleague Carlos Alberto Borges da Fonseca, the Portuguese delegate in the CAM presented briefly the activities organised by the Portuguese Commission during the week beyond our request.
Then, we moved on the presentation of the activity of the CAM during the working year 2023/2024 (blog, online guide, etc.) by the Secretary-General and the President of the Committee.
It was important to spread the results within the Committee, the delegates and the friends who attended the meeting to receive support, comments and questions regarding the activities done during the working year.
Then the secretary-general and the president presented their perspective for the following year 2024/2025. The idea is to involve directly the National Archives, according with the sources available on the internet in order to send the template for our project of the International online Guide. The idea has been presented to the Executive Board of the ICMH and the president agreed and supported our proposal.
The presentation of the logo that we will start using since the meeting is another sign to develop the community of expertise in the field of the military archives and to let other participants to the congress aware of the presence and availability of the Committee of Military Archives.
Finally, Kathleen Van Acker gave a presentation on NATO and the project (Canada in lead) to build a network and a community of experts in the declassification process.
With the closing remarks the meeting ended. See you next year!
