Last week, I was standing outside a hotel conference hall on the first day of the GLOBSEC security conference in Bratislava, Slovakia. I had arrived from Washington, DC, earlier that morning and had showered and changed, but not yet slept. Bleary-eyed, the coffee that I’d chugged down had not yet had any impact, I looked up from my phone and saw Zuzana Čaputová, the first woman and youngest person ever to be president of Slovakia, walk by with her team in tow. She then made her way to the largest of the conference stages and delivered the keynote address.
“We need rules to guide us,” she told the audience. “These must be valid and respected. For Slovakia, the EU and NATO, our democratic rules are our main rulebook, at home and abroad.”
Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month
Content from our partners
