EU: Five European countries are expected today to agree to form a joint gendarmerie, or paramilitary police force, to act in support of EU peacekeeping missions in troubled regions such as the Balkans.
France, Italy, Spain, Portugal and the Netherlands will sign a declaration of intent to form the force at a meeting of EU defence ministers in the Dutch seaside town of Noordwijk.
The proposal is to have an initial unit of 800 men and women ready for deployment by next year.
The new force's main task will be to provide support for EU missions, but it could also support UN and Nato peacekeeping operations.
Officials describe it as "a police unit with military status" specialising in crisis management tasks. The force will not operate within the EU's borders.
Modelled on the French gendarmes and the Italian caribinieri, the force will be drawn from existing personnel in the five founding countries.
Poland and Belgium have indicated that they may yet join the initiative, but Germany, which has a strict division between policing and military roles, has ruled out participating.
A Government spokesman said Ireland would not participate because the Garda does not have a paramilitary unit.
The idea of forming an EU gendarmerie was first mooted last year by the French Defence Minister, Ms Michèle Aliot-Marie.
She said a new force was needed to bridge the gap between military and civilian operations when it remained too dangerous for humanitarian non-governmental organisations to work in crisis regions.
"One notices in all crises that a purely military phase is followed systematically by a military-civilian phase when the maintenance of order becomes ever more important," she said.
Today's meeting of EU defence ministers will focus on how to improve member-states' military capacity at a time when most governments are reluctant to spend more on defence.
The Dutch Defence Minister, Mr Henk Kamp, said yesterday that improving military capability was essential if the EU was to have an effective foreign policy.
"The EU is faced with military shortfalls in, for instance, the fields of command and control, intelligence-gathering and strategic transport.
"These shortfalls result in restrictions relating to the time required to deploy troops, which can lead to risks in the larger and more intensive crisis response operations, particularly if several operations are conducted simultaneously," he said.
The ministers will also discuss the arrangements for the EU's takeover of a Nato-led peacekeeping mission in Bosnia, which is due to take place in December.
Much of the preparatory work for December's handover was completed during Ireland's EU presidency earlier this year.