Sweden, Finland reject idea of defence pact in EU

EU: Sweden and Finland have warned that a proposal in the EU's draft constitution to allow a group of countries to forge closer…

EU: Sweden and Finland have warned that a proposal in the EU's draft constitution to allow a group of countries to forge closer defence links would create tensions within Europe and across the Atlantic.

Sweden's Foreign Minister, Ms Laila Freivalds and her Finnish colleague, Mr Erkki Tuomioja, said that any crisis management operations carried out in the EU's name must have the approval of all member-states.

In a joint article in the Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter, the two ministers said they favoured a stronger EU security identity but suggested that the proposal agreed at the Convention on the Future of Europe would undermine solidarity within the Union.

"The convention's proposal about structured co-operation for a limited number of member- states to work towards the Union's ability to take on more demanding crisis-handling operations is not the right way to go," they said.

READ MORE

The Government has expressed misgivings about the proposal, insisting that any military operations undertaken in the EU's name must be approved by the entire Council of Ministers. Mr Tuomioja and Ms Freivalds said they wanted the EU to develop towards a "political alliance" with each member-state showing solidarity towards all the others.

They expressed support for a proposal to include in the constitutional treaty a "solidarity clause" committing member-states to come to one another's aid in the event of a terrorist attack.

"We support the idea of a solidarity clause that is based on consent and at the same time expresses the solidarity that already prevails among the member-states of the EU," they said.

The two ministers, whose countries are among the four EU countries that do not belong to NATO, rejected the idea of a mutual defence pact between some member-states. They said that the EU's emerging security identity should take a different form.

"We want preventive measures, interventions against terrorism, crisis interventions and stabilisation operations to keep the peace after military conflicts, to become natural tasks for the EU," they said.