Brussels, 05/01/2004 (Agence Europe) - In number 49 of its "Occasional Papers" series, the European Union Institute for Security Studies chaired by Nicole Gnesotto provides a well-documented study by Paul Luif of Austria on EU cohesion in the UN General Assembly. The analysis shows that cohesion has made good profess, in parallel to the development of common external and security policy. The degree of consensus still remains variable, however, depending upon the subject.
There is significant agreement between the Fifteen on the Middle East or on matters relating to human rights. On the other hand, opinions still differ over the strategic aspects, international security, disarmament in general and nuclear weapons in particular. France and the United Kingdom are the two Member States which distance themselves the most from the group. More often than not they stand out on strategic or armament issues for which these two Member States are closest to the United States through their votes, although the consensus within the EU has increasingly widened the gap between the Fifteen and the United States. The neutral and/or non-aligned countries of the EU form another group which stands out because of its divergent votes, except for Finland which has come increasingly closer to consensus. Finally, from among the candidate or acceding countries, it is Cyprus and Malta that have quite frequently adopted stances that are different from those of the EU whereas Turkey is very close to the European consensus. (Site: http://www.iss-eu.org ).