Brussels, 24/07/2012 (Agence Europe) - On Monday 23 July, on the sidelines of the Foreign Affairs Council, foreign affairs ministers from Sweden, Poland, Spain and Italy announced their “European and global strategy” for foreign policy, particularly for security in its broadest sense. This will be presented in May 2013 but which for the time being remains rather vague.
This strategy was carried out in consultation with four think tanks from their respective countries and aims to provide an independent contribution to the EU's long-term strategy. The Swedish minister, Carl Bildt, stressed that, “this will be for the 2014-2030 period”, whereas his Spanish counterpart, Gonzalo de Benito Secades, explained that, “this could be useful for the High Representative in the future”.
Bildt said that this strategy has not been devised to make good any possible shortfalls but to go forward and, “make Europe a strong power”. He emphasised that energy and foreign policy could be better integrated, as could external trade policy and its equivalent for crisis management. His Polish counterpart, Radoslaw Sikorski, affirmed that, “we need to take advantage of economies of scale and this is why we need to pool resources in different areas, including defence”. (CG/trans/fl)