Download FIRST ZAGREB EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

FIRST ZAGREB EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
EUROPEAN SECURITY: DEVELOPMENT AND PRACTICE OF THE
FOREIGN AND SECURITY POLICY OF THE EUROPEAN UNION (EU)
Executive Summary
1. The post World War I settlement failed to ensure lasting peace. Statesmen such as
Jean Monnet (France), were much more successful after World War II. The Soviet
threat, manifest in Stalin’s blockade of Berlin in 1948-49, brought erstwhile enemies
together. By 1958 Europe had three effective regional organisations: Council of
Europe (1949, rule of law, democracy and human rights), NATO (1949, security),
European Economic Community (1958, prosperity). Paras 1-8.
2. Construction of the Berlin Wall (1961) prompted new thinking. The Soviet Union
accepted the US presence in Europe, and sought to consolidate its hold on Eastern
Europe through a pan-European Security Conference. NATO decided to embark on
dialogue with the Warsaw Pact. West Germany renounced force as a means of
changing the status quo. As pan-European security negotiations began in 1973, EEC
political cooperation focussed on human rights, the “Third Basket” of the Helsinki
Final Act (HFA) of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, signed at
the first CSCE summit in 1975. The HFA became the benchmark for Western human
rights work in countries such as Romania. Paras 9-12.
3. EEC enlargement had begun with the UK, Ireland and Denmark (1973) followed
by Greece (1981), Portugal and Spain (1986), Sweden, Austria, and Finland (1995).
The objective was to spread peace, prosperity, and respect for human rights, while at
the same time achieving closer integration. But there were tensions between the
advocates of integration and enlargement. Paras 13-17.
4. In 1990, after the Cold War had been closed down in the Charter of Paris for a
New Europe at the second CSCE summit, the EU decided on further integration
through political, economic, and monetary union (the Euro), the development of a
Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and, in 1993, on enlargement in Central
and Eastern Europe, achieved in 2004. Programmes of assistance to transition
countries were put in place. But, less than one year after the CSCE summit, war in
Former Yugoslavia, and minority tensions elsewhere, were tarnishing the principles of
peace and cooperation set forth in the Paris Charter. On the basis of a French
initiative, originally designed to slow down enlargement, the EU (through a CFSP
Joint Action), the OSCE (through the High Commissioner on National Minorities),
and the Council of Europe (through a Minorities Framework Convention) worked to
promote stability and good neighbourly relations in Central and Eastern Europe. EU
support and incentives worked best in countries that had a realistic prospect of
membership. Controversy over a proposed constitution forced the EU to look inwards
during the Rose and Orange revolutions in Georgia and Ukraine. Paras 19-27.
5. Member states such as Poland and Sweden, considered that the EU was not doing
enough to bring countries such as Ukraine closer to the EU, while Russia objected to
EU – and NATO - encroachment on the post Soviet space. EU policies towards
Russia, a troublesome neighbour, have been based on illusions. Paras 28-31.