Dr Basil Germond was invited to give a talk in the ESRC Seminar Series 2012-14: ‘NATO after Afghanistan’. As an EU maritime specialist, Basil was invited to contribute to the panel on the future of NATO in counter-piracy and counter-terrorism by discussing the EU’s experience and what lessons NATO can learn from the Union. The seminar took place at the University of Birmingham on Friday 20 September 2013. The audience was drawn from academia, government officials, the military and NGOs.