Rome, 19/05/2000 (Agence Europe) - In an article published in the Italian press ("Corriere della Sera") and in several foreign papers, Italian Foreign Minister Lamberto Dini intervened in the debate opened by his German colleague Joschka Fischer. Mr Dini takes up the matter of stages, giving them a more precise content, mainly concerning the results that should be reached in the Intergovernmental Conference (IGC) currently in progress, and stressing that the reform resulting from this IGC should contain rules that will make the later "leap forward" possible.
We give below a schematic form of the objectives presented by Lamberto Dini.
A European Commission that does not have too many members, more weight for the large countries,
inclusion of defence in the Treaty
A. Objectives of the IGC, to be reached by the end of the year. The Italian Minister stresses that these objectives are "clear and not very numerous" but that one does not have the impression that all the governments are fully aware of the stakes. He points out the following targets to: 1) preserve the collegial nature and the cohesion of the European Commission. If it were enlarged out of all proportion to make room for each of the Member States, its political nature would be compromised; 2) avoid the return "in force" to the intergovernmental method which would force the EU to proceed at the rate of interminable diplomatic mediation; 3) drastically reduce the rule of unanimity within the Council, an indispensable corollary of ambitious policies concerning above all taxation (which influences the localisation of companies), the management of the natural environment, rationalisation of the "Social State" (in order to reconcile the safeguard of the "European model" with globalisation), management of immigration; 4) stop, or rather reverse the erosion in the weight of votes by the larger countries in Council; 5) include in the Treaty the decisions already taken in common defence matters; 6) anchor the Union to a Charter of Fundamental Rights. These are the aims for the current year, writes Mr Dini.
Replacing "enhanced cooperation" with "strengthened integration", both global and coherent
B. The "leap forward" for the future. According to Mr Dini, it is necessary to safeguard the "federal perspective", which will perhaps not be shared by all the Member States but at least by a "limited number of countries" and which is defined by different terms: centre of gravity, hard core, vanguard, and federation of nation states. Mr Dini writes: "the rules of this leap forward must be included in the Treaty from now on, by revising in the institutional framework represented by the IGC in progress, the concept of enhanced cooperation". This is in order to prefigure the institutional road to follow with a view to federal structures to be created from the outset between a limited number of countries (but still open to others). Mr Dini prefers the way within the Treaty, making it more flexible. In order to avoid the risk of uncontrolled progress of the different policies, Mr Dini confirms that Italy has proposed, in the work of the IGC, replacing the notion of "enhanced cooperation" by "strengthened integration". This "integration" should be extended to the sectors of foreign policy and defence policy and the conditions for its creation should be made more flexible, so that any one Member State cannot block integration on its own. The initial participant countries could be the "founding fathers", or the euro countries, or quite simply those who share the federal objective. Mr Dini does not give deadlines for this second phase. The main thing, as Jean Monnet used to say, is to have a clear goal and never to lose sight of it.
Mr Aznar: Europe is a "Union of States" - Mr Seixas da Costa: Portugal does not see itself in the federal model
Spanish Prime Minister José Maria Aznar, speaking in an interview published on Friday by several European dailies, including the Corriere della Sera, considered the intervention of Joshka Fischer "no doubt interesting". He added: "the debate is open, but we must now focus on other problems without forgetting that Europe is a union of States and that the fact of being a union of States has worked well so far. The problem to be resolved is brief and medium term. It is the need for a strong Commission, stronger than the present one, but maintaining institutional balance".
Portuguese Secretary of State for European Affairs Francisco Seixas da Costa told several Portuguese journalists in Brussels, according to the Lusa agency, that Portugal does not see itself in the federal model, even though it is "not afraid to enter the debate on federalism". In addition, the minister found in Mr Fischer's proposals "extremely interesting elements" such as the "association of national parliaments in the Community process".