EU SUMMIT: European Union leaders meeting in Brussels have agreed to revise proposals in the draft constitutional treaty that would allow some countries to forge ahead with closer defence links, writes Denis Staunton in Brussels
The Taoiseach said yesterday that the leaders now accepted that all military operations conducted in the EU's name must be subject to the political control of all member-states meeting in the Council of Ministers.
"It's a question that the council maintains and holds political control. That's the issue, that there's not a group going out acting in the name of the totality without there being reference to everybody," Mr Ahern said.
"I have to say there was nobody around the table opposing that position, although it's not clear in the draft that's presently in front of us. But the President in his conclusion last night made it clear that those two articles would be re-examined," he said.
The defence issue dominated the final hours of the two-day summit, with Britain's Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, attempting to reassure Washington, which is critical of the EU plan, fearing it will undermine the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, NATO.
The US ambassador to NATO, Mr Nicholas Burns, this week described a proposal to establish an independent EU military planning headquarters as "the most serious threat to the future of NATO". NATO will hold a special meeting on the issue on Monday, at Washington's request.
Mr Blair discussed the plan with his German, French and Belgian counterparts in the margins of the summit but he insisted yesterday that he would not agree to any move that would undermine NATO. "We need strong European defence, but nothing whatever must put at risk our essential defence guarantees within NATO. France and Germany recognise that, in the end, European defence has no future as a competitor to NATO. It can only work if it's fully compatible with NATO," he said.
Mr Blair backs closer EU co-operation on defence and favours proposals to allow "structural co-operation" on the part of an avant-garde group within the EU. France, Germany, Belgium and Luxembourg want to go further, however, by establishing a military planning headquarters and introducing a mutual defence clause for countries involved in structural co-operation on defence.
The French President, Mr Jacques Chirac, acknowledged that Britain had "problems" with some elements of the plan, which he denied was directed against NATO or the US.
"We want to create a European defence policy that is on the one hand totally open to all - there is no question of barring anyone from joining - and on the other hand completely in keeping with our commitments to NATO," he said.
The draft treaty proposes that EU member-states "whose military capabilities fulfil higher criteria" can enter into structured co-operation on defence, which would include a mutual defence guarantee.
"When the Council of Ministers adopts European decisions relating to matters covered by structured co-operation, only the members of the Council of Ministers that represent the member-states taking part in structured co-operation shall participate in the deliberations and the adoption of such decisions," the draft text says.
Mr Ahern said Ireland would not join a mutual defence pact and would only take part in EU military missions limited to the so-called "Petersberg tasks" such as peacekeeping and crisis management. But he insisted that Ireland must be fully consulted on all military activity conducted in the name of the EU.
"We just want to be fully consulted on anything that's happening in the name of the Union and [to ensure] that we have open and transparent accountability. That's what we want to see cleared. But we're not going to be in a role on structured co-operation in any other position than Petersberg tasks," he said.
A senior German official yesterday compared the development of Europe's defence policy to the creation of Economic and Monetary Union. He suggested, however, that the project would be completed in much less than the 30 years it took to launch the euro.
British, French, German and Belgian officials will prepare a joint paper on defence during the next few weeks but one senior Commission official suggested that the issue could be a defining one for the British Prime Minister.
"Tony Blair will have to decide whether he is a 49 per cent European or a 51 per cent European," he said.