A CONSENSUS has emerged among EU member states to include references to EU peacekeeping, humanitarian tasks, and crisis management in the treaty of the Union. It will be the first time the treaty has legitimised in a practical way the collective EU use of military forces.
After two days of detailed talks at the treaty changing Inter Governmental Conference, its Irish chairman, Mr Noel Dorr, said it now appeared certain the language would be in the treaty, although its precise shape and location has to be determined.
Mr Dorr said a drafting process was underway in the IGC, with the aim of leaving ministers with a small number of clear cut political choices.
Some ingredients in the security/defence debate were now clearer, he said, though key issues like the structure of the relationship between the EU and the Western European Union are still contentious.
Agreement on a treaty place for peacekeeping reflects the growing consensus among member states about the shape and scope of enhanced EU security structures for the next 10 years. These involve the EU borrowing the military capabilities of NATO through the WEU, without the EU getting involved directly in military operations.
Operations would be strictly confined to what are known as Petersberg tasks, operations of a strictly peacekeeping or humanitarian kind, ranging from air sea rescue to UN type missions.
Whether the EU will, as Irish draft treaty change alternatives suggest, "instruct" the WEU, the European arm of NATO, or simply have recourse to it" will depend on the evolution of the debate within NATO about the Europeanisation of its own structures.
The British are reluctant to see the WEU drawn in too close to the Union, while the French are enthusiastic.
Others are less concerned with the institutional closeness as with the mechanism by which the EU controls operations in which it is implicated. Swedish Finnish proprosals, supported by Dublin, reflected in the Irish treaty text discussed yesterday - it refers to the possibility - that whenever the Union has to the WEU to elaborate and implement decisions of the Union on humanitarian and rescue tasks, peacekeeping and crisis management, all member states shall be entitled to fully participate in the preparation and implementation of such joint activities ..."
Crucially, from the point of view of the Irish and other neutrals, the Irish working document for the IGC makes clear the consensus of member states and now also involves an understanding that no member state will be asked to sign up to mutual defence guarantees. This copperfastens the Government's definition of Irish neutrality and makes merger with the WEU impossible.
But although the general shape of treaty changes on common defence closely mirror the commitments suggested in the recent White Paper on Foreign Policy, proposals to tighten the treaty wording on the aspiration to a future common defence may spark controversy in Dublin, as the original did during the Maastricht debate.
Mr Dorr says there is also an emerging consensus that the treaty reference to the framing of a common defence policy "which might in time lead to a common defence" needs to be strengthened.
The alternative words "with a view to a common defence", "leading in time to a common defence", or "in the perspective of a common defence" are being suggested.
