The Diplomat
The Council of Ministers yesterday referred to the Parliament the Treaty of cooperation in the field of defense between Spain and France, while authorizing the expression of Spain’s consent to be bound by the Treaty.
During the twenty-sixth Spanish-French Summit, held in Montauban on March 15, 2021, the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, and the President of the French Republic, Emmanuel Macron, undertook to review the content of the Cooperation Agreement in the Field of Defense signed by both countries on October 7, 1983.
To this end, the Ministers of Defense of the two countries, Margarita Robles and Florence Parly, agreed on March 28, 2022 in Madrid, during the meeting of the Spanish-French Defense and Security Council, to draft a new text covering the security and defense relations between the two countries, formalized in a new Cooperation Agreement which was signed on January 19 in Barcelona during the bilateral Summit of 2023, after authorization by the Council of Ministers.
The purpose of this agreement is to strengthen and expand cooperation in the field of defense and security between Spain and France, while taking into account the new situation of the closest strategic environment, which has been greatly degraded after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and establishing a strong and renewed commitment to European security and stability in a broad bilateral and multilateral framework, hand in hand with the European Union and the Atlantic Alliance.
