Paris, 30/06/2000 (Agence Europe) - French Defence Minister Alain Richard pointed out during a meeting, on Thursday, with a group of journalists before the beginning of the French Presidency on 1 July, that there are five major deadlines under the French Presidency's term of office, following enormous progress made during the last two years with the development of a European defence policy. At the same time, he recalled that the EU15's defence policy is "an intergovernmental policy, a voluntary cooperation". He noted that this is the only thing that works today as no-one today would accept a "supranational defence system in which the governments would lose control of their armed forces" (questioned on the role of Mr Solana, he said that the High Representative plays a role of "expression and implementation of choices made by the governments").
The meetings announced by Mr Richard are: - from Saturday 1 July, a seminar gathering, in Paris (with the participation of Mr Richard and Mr Solana), the political decision-makers, the chiefs of staff of the armed forces, the national armaments directors and the directors responsible for the Fifteen's strategic affairs, who will discuss crisis factors involving Europe, the definition of European capabilities, technical stakes of the armaments Europe, the aims of the defence Europe; - on 22 September in Paris, an informal meeting of EU defence ministers, who will mainly examine a catalogue of forces required for the Rapid Intervention Force that the EU hopes to set in place; - on 16 November in Marseilles, a ministerial meeting of the WEU Council; - on 20 and 21 November in Brussels, the Force Generation
Conference, where the Member States will announce their contribution to the future European Force, and assess any shortcomings in this field (the General Affairs Council will "validate" these positions); - on 7 and 8 December, the European Council of Nice, which will draw conclusions.
In answer to questions, Mr Richard mainly set out the:
- Institutional issues. At the present time, "there is no Council of Defence Ministers", but informal meetings. We do not have decision-making power but we try to arrive at the General Affairs Council with positions that can be validated", said Mr Richard, who said "it is necessary to make diplomacy and defence systems work together". He felt, however, that the informal defence ministers' meetings "will become less informal". The four non-aligned EU countries have "joined the global objective", he noted, concerning the stance taken by the neutral parties, in response to a question on the timeliness of annexing a protocol on Article V of the WEU Treaty (mutual assistance) to the EU Treaty. "Do we need to bump off the WEU?", asked Mr Richard in response to a question. He noted that, legally, "we would have the possibility of doing so between ten of us and the other 28 countries could not prevent it, but we have allowed the WEU to establish itself in a situation in which these countries have developed a certain role, and if one wanted to dissolve the WEU, this would entail endless discussions. As for the need to revise the EU Treaty in order to take the development of ESDP into account, from this Intergovernmental Conference (IGC) on, Mr Richard pointed out that such revision is not necessary if the decision making capacity remains in the hands of the Council of Ministers, "which is our hope". A delegation of Council powers to the Political and Security Committee in the event of crisis is enough, he felt, stressing that the Committee must be able to react rapidly, which would not be the case if it were necessary to revise the Treaty immediately. We are "not at all opposed" to revision but this could be done "in some years from now, on the basis of experience", said Mr Richard.
- Attitude of the United States toward European defence. Yesterday, in Washington, recounted Mr Richard, the US Defence Secretary said that the United States is in favour of Australian intervention in East Timor. He went on to add: perhaps the United States could grant the Europeans "the same level of trust as to the Australians …" - contribution by the different Member States to the Headline Goal. France does not plan to make any announcements and hopes that everyone will make a contribution. In addition, it should perhaps "keep a range of capabilities tucked away in a drawer", as it may be called on to pull them out. There must be no distinction made between the "large" countries and the others, said Mr Richard, noting that, if "three or four countries do not contribute anything at all to the "future European force", this would make the commitment by the Fifteen in Helsinki "fragile". The Force Generation Conference in November will be very important, stressed the minister, pointing out that "we shall also have the possibility to appeal for contributions from non-member states". Mr Richard, who noted that it will be necessary to plan joint training for the future units of the European Rapid Reaction Force, recalled, in answer to questions, that the only multinational NATO element (in "multi-ownership", he said) are the rapid reconnaissance planes, the AWACs, while everything else is "purely national", including that which "poses problems", like intelligence technologies, which are American.
- Possibility of developing enhanced cooperation in defence matters. Answering remarks on this subject by President Chirac in his speech at the Bundestag, Mr Richard said that, over the past two years, the president has backed the development of defence for the Fifteen. "Defence capabilities must be carried out by Fifteen" (even if the Eurocorps, the important element, excludes, for example, the United Kingdom, Italy and the Netherlands).
- Geographical limits to future EU operations. According to Mr Richard, such a "geographical dividing line does exist but will move in time", and it should therefore not be put on a map. "There will be a development in time of the notion of European security environment", said Mr Richard.
- Objections voiced by Turkey (which called for improvements by the Nice Summit) to the arrangements concluded by the recent EU summit in Porto for the involvement of European non-EU Allies in crisis management operations conducted by the EU. "I noted Turkey's singular position", replied Mr Richard in answer to this question, recalling that other "geographically European" countries, like Norway, have expressed satisfaction about these arrangements. These mechanisms will begin to work next week. We shall discuss the matter with Turkey, and see what Turkey wants to improve, but it may be necessary for Turkey also to evaluate its own position and impact that these decisions will have on its influence", remarked Mr Richard (who recalled that Turkey had been the only country to oppose the attribution of KFOR command to Eurocorps, but that it then had to change its position).