European security strategy

By 421 votes in favour to 90 votes against with 15 abstentions, Parliament adopted an own initiative report by Helmut KUHNE (PES, DE) on the European Security Strategy. It welcomed the comprehensive understanding of the concept of ‘security’ as expressed in the European Security Strategy (ESS), and shared the view that key threats to global security presently include terrorism, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs), unresolved regional conflicts, failed and failing states and organised crime. These threats can neither be primarily addressed nor exclusively resolved by military means.

Parliament emphasised the positive contributions already made by the EU Situation Centre (SITCEN) in combining all available civil, military and diplomatic intelligence to produce cogent background analyses of any given situation. It urges the Member States to further intensify their information-sharing with the SITCEN,

With regard to milestones achieved, Parliament underscored, in particular with respect to achieving the full operational mobility of the Battle Groups by 2007, the importance of the Global Approach on Deployability and, in this context, welcomed the contributions made by the coordinating centres of Athens and Eindhoven in the military transport.

It notes with satisfaction the rapid action taken in creating the European Defence Agency (EDA) in advance of the formal adoption of the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe. The activities of the EDA should benefit the Union, not only in further developing defence capabilities in crisis management, but also in bringing about a rationalisation of research and development costs within the Member States and, in the long run, helping to contribute to the creation of a European armaments market.

Parliament went on to call on the countries defined in the Non-Proliferation Treaty as nuclear-weapon states, in particular the USA, China and Russia, in view of the uncontrollably spreading danger of terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, to review their own nuclear policies in the spirit of the Non-Proliferation Treaty. It regretted the efforts made by the US administration over the last four years to promote the development of new nuclear weapons and its refusal to ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. Parliament also expressed concern at Russia’s inadequate efforts to protect its nuclear stocks. It criticised China’s massive increase in military spending (12,6%), its comprehensive modernisation of its nuclear armed forces and the increase in its imports of modern weapons technologies.

Finally, Parliament encouraged the new European Defence Agency to examine the possibilities for cooperation with NATO in the area of armaments.