26/04/2006 (Agence Europe) - At a seminar of the WEU Parliamentary Assembly in London on 25 April, on the eve of the NATO Foreign Ministers Meeting in Sofia on 27 and 28 April, MEP Geoffrey Van Orden (Conservative, UK) repeated his call for reinvigoration of NATO. The involvement of the European Institutions in defence “adds nothing to the military capabilities of the democracies”. It is “a divisive distraction, intruding into the most sensitive areas of national sovereignty, wasting scarce resources, and undermining NATO,” he said in a press release. He considered NATO to be “an example of a political-military alliance that has already adapted to changed circumstances” and urged it now “to begin a fresh review of its own core structure and role and consider development of regional alliances in Africa and Asia”. Mr Van Orden, who is the rapporteur for Bulgaria's accession to the EU, thought, too, that holding the meeting of NATO Foreign Ministers in Sofia had “enormous symbolic and practical importance”.