At their summit in Brussels on Thursday 29 and Friday 30 June, European leaders are expected to stress the importance of strengthening the resilience of the EU and its Member States to major natural and man-made disasters, through an “all-hazards” approach in all strategic areas, prevention, preparedness and response, as advocated by the European Commission, with the support of the Council of the EU (see EUROPE 13194/8).
The draft conclusions of the European Council, obtained by EUROPE and dated 25 June, add this subject to the agenda of the heads of state or government.
The European Council is expected to underline “the importance of strengthening resilience in strategic areas through an all-hazards approach to preparedness and response using relevant mechanisms, in particular the Union Civil Protection Mechanism”. This pan-European solidarity mechanism channels emergency aid in kind to all countries that submit a request to the European Commission when their national capacities are unable to cope with a major disaster.
The European Council will “acknowledge the challenges posed by cross-sectoral and cross-border crises or natural and man-made disasters, many of which are exacerbated by climate change and the evolving security landscape in Europe and globally”.
In so doing, the draft conclusions respond to the Communication ‘Acting together to deal with future emergencies’, presented by the Commission at the beginning of February with a view to improving national and collective prevention and preparedness for major disasters with transboundary effects - with a recommendation to the Member States on EU resilience targets for 2030 (see EUROPE 13117/5).
At one point it was thought that this subject would already be on the agenda of the March European Council, as the Commission Vice-President responsible for Foresight, Maroš Šefčovič, had announced in February, getting ahead of himself (see EUROPE 13129/11).
The presentation of the Commission’s communication was immediately followed by a tour of the Member States’ capitals by the European Commissioner for Crisis Management, Janez Lenarčič.
The future Spanish Presidency of the EU Council already wants to make strengthening civil protection capacities to deal with disasters a priority (see EUROPE 13119/4).
To see the draft conclusions of the European Council: https://aeur.eu/f/7q0 (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)