Brussels, 05/05/2011 (Agence Europe) - The current feverishness being experienced within several EU chancelleries regarding certain European rules necessarily concerns every convinced and well-informed European. In such moments, it is useful to take a look at the past to remind us not only of the contribution made by politics but also - and this is often of capital importance - of diplomacy. This was the approach taken by Pietro Calamia in a note on “Italy's European diplomacy”, published in Rivista di Studi Politici Internazionali (No 309, 20 April, via Bruxelles, 00198 Rome. Email: mariagrazia.melchionni@uniroma.it.)
The former permanent representative for Italy with the European Union (and also with the OECD) has not forgotten the role played by Italian diplomacy in Europe, and points out that three of his colleagues spoke precisely of this in three “excellent volumes”: Silvio Fagiolo in “Idea dell'Europa nelle relazioni internazionali”; Rocco Cangelosi in “Il ventennio costituzionale dell'Unione europea: testimonianze di un diplomatico al servizio dell'Unione europea”; and Roberto Ducci in “Le speranze d'Europa (carte sparse 1943-1985)”. Ambassador Calamia above all points to the fact that Roberto Ducci had chaired the committee for the drafting of the Treaties of Rome, the “founding act of the European adventure”. He evokes a number of remarkable remarks from his famous predecessor on the subject of many “historic” moments of this adventure (from the time of President de Gaulle). Speaking of Rocco Cangelosi, Pietro Calamia sees in some of his analyses “accents that are more federalist than diplomatic”, going on to comment: “On the subject of Italy's diplomatic role, there is a federalist varnish that deserves to be highlighted”. He goes on to conclude that in Italy, during all these years, everyone played a role, and the federalist momentum was constructive for the Italian government's diplomatic action and policy. (mg/transl.jl)