07 April 2025
Welcome Remarks by Prof Kumar Ramakrishna, Dean of RSIS, at the 16th Asia-Pacific Programme for Senior National Security Officers
Ms Sun Xueling, Minister of State, Ministry of Home Affairs and Ministry of Social and Family Development; Ambassadors, Distinguished Guests; Ladies and Gentlemen.
Good morning. It gives me great pleasure to welcome all of you to the 2025 edition of the Asia-Pacific Programme for Senior National Security Officers, or APPSNO, for short. APPSNO is organised by the Centre of Excellence for National Security (CENS) at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) at Nanyang Technological University (NTU), with the support of the National Security Coordination Secretariat in the Prime Minister’s Office.
APPSNO brings together senior national security practitioners, policymakers, and academics from various countries for a week of professional networking and many opportunities for hopefully, a rich and stimulating exchange of ideas and perspectives.
The theme for this year’s APPSNO is “Emerging Technology Risks and National Security”. In choosing this theme, we considered how countries are increasingly harnessing emerging technologies such as quantum technology and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to boost their economic and strategic advantage.
Unsurprisingly, this brings both new as well as evolving security risks. While quantum technologies and AI can have many benefits, the reality is that such technologies can also be used to coerce, disrupt, and aggravate social cleavages within a country, and create national security challenges and/or exacerbate ongoing security risks.
While emerging technologies—including artificial intelligence (AI), quantum computing and biotechnology—are rapidly reshaping industries and redefining societal norms, such technologies are also simultaneously widening digital attack surfaces for malicious use. This rapid expansion introduces new vulnerabilities and greater complexities which traditional security measures may potentially struggle to manage effectively.
For national security practitioners and policymakers, striking a balance between navigating the speed of technological innovation – as well as devising strategies and responses to threats – is taking on a new complexity.
Hence the key challenge faced by all states, including Singapore, is developing a deeper understanding of such risks and threats, and how to mitigate them.
Against this backdrop, the five panels at this year’s APPSNO encourage wide engagement with these pressing issues, and naturally, they will all discuss risks and mitigation, and how states could cooperate on the latter. The panels will:
- address a range of risks from AI besides disinformation and cybersecurity, including potential mitigation measures;
- explore the effects of quantum technology on cryptography and what this means for infrastructure, finance, communications, and national security;
- examine the increased bio-security risks arising from the use of new technologies, and how states could collaborate to manage cross-border and regional biosecurity threats;
- analyze the technology-related economic security measures currently deployed by states, the effects on economic development, as well as how states can secure access to strategic technologies in the face of tech-related economic measures; and
- understand the impacts of supply chain disruptions and interference on national security, and potential solutions for ensuring supply chain security and resilience.
We are most fortunate to have speakers and participants who are highly accomplished in their respective domains and who have arrived from around the globe to share their expertise. I am grateful to all speakers and participants for taking time out of their busy schedules to join us in Singapore for APPSNO.
Given the range and spread of issues that will be discussed, it is not likely that all of us will be experts in every field. APPSNO, however, is an excellent opportunity for participants to discover and appreciate diverse national understandings and interpretations of national security from the perspective of every participant and speaker.
Given the challenges we face as a global community, the sharing of ideas, experiences and solutions is vital among national security practitioners. Doubtless, some of your most meaningful encounters and exchanges will take place during your informal exchanges or even during the external excursions planned for you.
I hope that you will stay in touch with your fellow participants even after APPSNO 2025, and remain connected to our wider, growing international APPSNO alumni network.
In closing, thank you again for making the commitment to come here to contribute to the discussion and exchange perspectives on various national security issues faced by our respective countries. I wish you all a very productive and engaging week ahead.
