Brussels, 18/11/2014 (Agence Europe) - The meeting of European defence ministers on Tuesday 18 November in Brussels, as part of the EU Council of Foreign Affairs' “Defence” session, helped create the conditions for making several decisions affecting cooperation between member states in the areas of defence, cyber-defence and capability enhancement for third countries.
The Council adopted a political framework for systematic and long-term defence cooperation. Although the title of the document suggests lofty goals, the results achieved are somewhat less certain, given the fact that follow-up by member states in this connection is voluntary and according to a senior official from the European External Action Service (EEAS), is even rather “light”. It seeks to promote closer cooperation between member states, particularly with regard to acquiring military equipment both in the first stages of the acquisition process (common definition of needs and technical specifications) and at the end of the process, namely, in the use of the equipment (maintenance), which accounts for two thirds of the costs of equipment in question over its entire life cycle. Another EU official said that aligning national defence planning was a “nightmare”.
In the area of cyber defence, the Council also adopted a political framework. This is more concrete because it intends to ensure that the networks used in the framework of EU operations missions is protected. It involves both protecting against cyber attacks on networks in the theatre of operations and those employed in Brussels by the European External Action Service (EEAS) when communicating with external missions or those of member states.
Finally, the Council agreed on the next stages to be followed with regard to the initiative for supporting the strengthening of third country and international organisations' capability in crisis prevention. The EEAS and the European Commission will be put in charge of presenting the European Council in June 2015 (which will partly focus on defence) a joint proposal for the implementation of this initiative. The idea underpinning this proposal is that it must provide coordination and financing mechanisms, in support for training security forces and transferring equipment to them. The inspiration for this kind of support framework is expected to be based on several pilot projects that will be launched in Mali and Somalia at the beginning of 2015. (JK)