Brussels, 09/12/2003 (Agence Europe) - The External Relations Council on Tuesday approved Javier Solana's document on the European security strategy, to be adopted formally by the European Council which is to give Mr Solana a mandate to present proposals for the implementation of this strategy (yesterday's EUROPE, p.6). The document "A safer Europe in a better world" aims to give the enlarged Europe a genuine security strategy and to lists the five fundamental threats the EU must face up to, and their political implications. This document was not discussed between the Member States as these have been working to refine it during seminars (in Rome, Paris, Stockholm). No great changes, therefore, between the Thessaloniki document and the current one, apart from the odd "linguistic clarification": where the first document spoke of the EU's "pre-emptive engagement", the final version talks of its "preventive engagement". Explanations from Christian Gallach, Javier Solana's spokesperson: "this cannot be translated" into several EU languages, which, furthermore, is "almost always associated with military action" in American culture. "The EU wanted clearly to divorce the military connotation from this term", she added, specifying that this did not affect the EU's capacity to undertake "robust action" is needs be. The Summit should call upon Javier Solana to makes proposals for the concrete implementation of this strategy in, for example, the fight against the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.
The Council also approved conclusions on the non-proliferation of WMD, which will be approved by the European Council. It provides for a list of measures concerning, amongst other things, the universalisation of Treaties, the reinforcement of the role of the Security Council, controls on exports of weapons, the fight against illegal trafficking, co-operation with key partners such as the United States.