SEEKING solutions to Europe's employment and drugs problems, managing the peace process in the former Yugoslavia and overseeing the revision of the EU treaties will be the main issues in the Irish EU Presidency, according to the Tanaiste.
Acknowledging that the European public has not been kept well enough informed of EU developments in the past, Mr Spring said yesterday the EU in future "will have to explain why it is doing certain things". The Government would have to ensure the Irish people felt there was a connection between them and the Presidency.
Announcing details of the Presidency, to run from July 1st to December 31st, Mr Spring said Irish Ministers would have to chair more than 40 meetings in Brussels, Luxembourg and Ireland, while officials will chair over 200 working groups.
"Irish Ministers and officials will represent the European Union at international gatherings all over the world," he said.
He identified employment, justice matters including drugs, economic and monetary union, the Intergovernmental conference and the EU's external relations as the main issues to be dealt with during the Presidency.
. Employment: There was an acceptance, said Mr Spring, that no state could solve its unemployment problem alone. "But there is a prospect of doing something about it through Europe", he said.
The Dublin summit in December would examine the second EU annual report on unemployment, and the Irish Presidency would also seek to "carry forwards proposals agreed at the Essen summit to deal with the problem.
An initiative by the European Commission President, Mr Jacques Santer, to agree an "employment pact" between unions and employers would also be on the agenda:
. Drugs: Last December's European summit in Madrid had agreed a programme on drugs and a report on its implementation would be presented to the summit in Dublin. "We will not protect our citizens from the drugs scourge unless we have total European and international cooperation.
"Four years ago there tended to be just token acknowledgment of the drugs problem. There is now a palpable acknowledgment in the Council of Ministers that the problem has to be tackled head on."
. Economic and monetary union: The Government would have to continue preparations for the move to a single currency. Of particular interest would be the relationship between those who joined and those who did not.
. The Intergovernmental Conference: Ireland's task in chairing the IGC will not just be to carry its work forward. "In the discussions leading up to Maastricht, the public were not well informed. There will be an onus on us to keep the public well informed as the IGC goes on."
He acknowledged that many issues discussed at the IGC, such as the future relationship between the EU's institutions, were technical and that "it is difficult to get people talking about them".
. External Relations: He identified the situation in the former Yugoslavia, the Mediterranean and the Middle East, and the EU's relations with Russia and North America, as prominent issues which would have to be handled by the Government. Handling the former Yugoslavia would be "a very demanding task".
The EU, during the Irish Presidency, would have to do everything it could to ensure the implementation of the Dayton peace agreement. "It behoves all of us to ensure that whatever decisions are taken by the US and the EU, that we manage the problem and we do not take steps that would open doors to a return to warfare," he said.
He rejected suggestions that Ireland's handling of the issue, which is central to the debate about future European security arrangements, was compromised by the Government's cautious approach to involvement in such arrangements. "We have a positive contribution to make and we have made one through the United Nations and the OSCE."
Mr Spring said he believed the Nato sponsored Partnership for Peace programme was "an idea whose time has come". The recent White Paper on Foreign Policy committed the Government to exploring the possibility of involvement in that programme. However, the Democratic Left leader, Mr Proinsias De Rossa, recently repeated his party's opposition to such a move.
Mr Spring said he believed the programme represented "an enhancement of the security architecture of the continent".
Mr Spring will address the UN General Assembly in New York in September on behalf of the EU, and Ireland will also handle the EU's preparations for the World Trade Organisation ministerial conference in Singapore in December.