Javier Elorza
Former Ambassador to the EU, France, Russia and Italy
Last September 19, a report was published by 12 members of supposedly independent Franco-German think tanks, foundations and universities, entitled “Sailing the high seas: reforming and enlarging the European Union in the 21st century”. All its members are of both nationalities, appointed by the French Minister for Europe, Laurence Boone, and the German Minister for Europe and Climate, Anna Lührmann. With the exception of one former MEP (Beres Pervenche, French), none of its members has the slightest experience in the Brussels battlefield; they are laboratory “brains” and theoretical analysts without much renown. What is obvious is that they act at the dictation of their mandataries and that their supposed independence is more than questionable, having been appointed by Paris and Berlin.
Their report pretends to pontificate on the future of the European Union (EU), on the enlargement and the reform of the Treaties. It is curious because Brussels is a very big house made with thousands of very small bricks, the result of thousands of negotiations since 1957 and by a multitude of countries, and now some theoretical neophytes from two countries arrive and pretend to expose what the rest of us should do. The report ends up giving “instructions” to the Spanish and Belgian presidencies on what to do until the elections to the European Parliament in June next year, and then for the following presidencies until 2029. Unusual and all the more so if the French and German governments are backing this absolutely sui generis operation in Europe. In the past, committees of wise men had been proposed, elected by all, which President Aznar, among others, vetoed, saying that he was a wise man, think tanks (Carlos Westendorp chaired one in 1995, which was the basis for the Amsterdam Intergovernmental Conference of 1996-1997), even of European personalities (chaired by Felipe Gonzalez in 2006). No one had ever had the audacity to entrust a group of strangers from only two countries to set and define the path to be taken by 27 sovereign Member States in the European Union. And on top of that, the report states that they have spoken to people of “other” nationalities to ask their opinion, without saying which ones. Unusual and not credible.
The report is based on two central ideas. The first is that the enlargement to the Balkans, Ukraine and Moldova (Turkey remains in the background due to its current deficient situation in the field of human rights and rule of law) is “necessary for geostrategic reasons”, without further ado. It does not say which ones, nor does it explain them, although it is inferred that these reasons are to prevent Russia from occupying or influencing these countries and territories: “If I do not enter these countries, Russia will occupy these places”.
The Treaty of Rome and its successive heirs up to the Treaty of Lisbon have never included the “geostrategic” motive among their objectives. According to Article 49 of the Treaty on European Union, potential candidates have to be European states, respect the values of Article 2 of the EU Treaty (human rights, rule of law, democracy…) and fulfill the Copenhagen conditions, period. Now according to this report the EU would be playing on a “monopoly” board trying to occupy squares so that Russia does not do so, entering, or rather anticipating, participating in a game of controlling territories and countries for which the EU was not created and is not prepared. Even NATO should not do so because it is by definition a “defensive” organization. Russia in the past has not played “monopoly” in Europe as such, except for some occasional operations justified by the strong presence of the Russian-Fone population and its marginalization.
The report considers that, for “geostrategic” reasons, the EU “should” obligatorily and necessarily expand, in addition to the Balkans (which are mentioned in an obligatory manner to conceal the fact that they do not pose any serious problem for the peace and security of Europe at this time with some perfectly isolable and manageable local conflict, such as Kosovo-Serbia), to Ukraine, Moldova and later Georgia, former USSR countries and neighbors of Russia. What is the “geostrategic” value for Western Europe of seeking contiguity with Russia by provoking misgivings, fears and emotional sensitivities for security reasons in that country, which have already led it to war on two occasions? What we are doing is creating tension and a breeding ground that accelerates the war process and Russia’s determination. This does not seem to be the best way to achieve peace in the region, but rather to inflame it. And every day there is more evidence of this, days ago Russia decided to build a military base in North Abkhazia, a territory subject to a decades-long frozen conflict with Georgia.
If strategic reasons are used in order to control spaces, the other side can counterattack. Days ago Sergey Lavrov warned that the Kremlin will consider it unacceptable for US or NATO troops to return to Afghanistan, whatever the project may be. Box abandoned, box occupied. And why not think that the events in Niger and the Sahel are again occupied boxes in retaliation to the West for the war in Ukraine. Or that the current conflict in Israel and Gaza could be an initiative not only of Hamas but also of Hezbollah supported by Iran, well seen by Russia, which could destabilize that area, perhaps in connection with the war in Ukraine. In Syria the box is definitely Russian.
If we were to follow the “geostrategic” game, it would be much more useful and effective to incorporate Turkey, a more powerful economy, with one of the largest European armies and with significant influence in Central Asia and even in the Middle East and Libya. What is the “strategic” use of a Balkans that does not have great economic weight? And a Ukraine which opens a breach of conflict with Russia, not to mention Article 42, paragraph 7 of the Lisbon Treaty which provides for unconditional military solidarity in the event of armed aggression (equivalent to Article 5 of the NATO Treaty) which would prevent any accession of a third country at war with other States, especially with Russia? Why do Germany and its companion France continue to boycott the integration of Turkey, which should be attracted by democratizing it? It has been at the doors of the EU for several tens of years now, and has lost all patience. Spain has always supported the principle of Turkey’s accession.
Surprisingly, and in spite of what has been said, the Granada Declaration of the informal European Council includes this “geostrategic” reason for the need for enlargement as an essential motive, which appears in the report of the 12 Franco-German independents. In short, the 27 seem to accept the report of the 12 on this point. It is just as well that they do not go further, and do not set any list of countries, nor any timetable or date for the start of negotiations, nor do they take up their proposal to set a deadline for enlargement, that of 2030 (a date which the 12 intend to include in the conclusions of the European Council of December 2023). In this respect, the President of the Commission, Ursula Von der Leyen, has made it clear that there will be no shortcuts or target dates (rejecting with her the 2030 mentioned by the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, and by the report of the 12), and that each candidate will have to strictly comply with the conditions required for its accession to the EU. That said, at the December European Council in Brussels there will be great pressure to start negotiations with Ukraine and Moldova and some Balkan to dissimulate. The Commission has to deliver its annual evaluation report on enlargement in November, which will be decisive in this respect. In any case, we should avoid setting a target date for the end of these negotiations if necessary.
The second central idea is that it is necessary to reform the Treaties prior to this enlargement, an old German obsessive thesis which is once again present, and which Macron shares. It is curious because the exercise carried out at the Conference on the Future of Europe (2020/2022), concluded at Council level with a refusal to convene a Convention by a majority of Member States, a legal requirement of Article 48 of the Lisbon Treaty to trigger it. It was also noted under the Czech presidency that the alternative path of the “passerelles” (moving one by one the subjects from unanimity in the current Treaty to qualified majority by a unanimous decision of the European Council), failed miserably when analyzing a questionnaire submitted to the 27 Member States where there were crossed and multiple vetoes not to implement these passerelles.
If the Council does not wish to reform the Treaties, it is due to weighty reasons. Indeed, there would be six or seven referendums, and we already know that the two referendums in France and the Netherlands buried the Giscard Constitution. Secondly, several countries, possibly from the East, but also some founding countries, would make regressive and involutionary proposals undoing the road already travelled and renationalizing part of the content of the current Treaties. And finally, there would be dozens of motley proposals of all kinds (what is known in Brussels as a “Christmas tree”) that would make it impossible to manage the negotiation and its final outcome. Finally, a multitude of cross vetoes is highly foreseeable.
Although this issue has not been addressed in Granada, it is good to analyze the content of the reforms proposed in the report of the 12. It is noted that the revisions suggested for the Treaties are almost entirely of an institutional nature (percentages of population for the blocking minority, pact between Parliament and the European Council to appoint the President of the Commission, number of Commissioners (reducing them or taking away the voting rights of some), number of MEPs, creation of new strange bodies (such as a Probity Office to control the Commission, or another, a Court of representatives of the supreme courts of EU countries, to pressure and monitor the Court of Luxembourg, etc., etc.). etc.).
It is an approach similar to that of Giscard D’Estaing in the Convention, in which his status as a polytechnician took precedence, imagining devices and mechanisms of power, i.e. institutional reforms (several of which always reduced the powers of the Commission), trying to favor above all Germany. On the other hand, nothing of policies or new mechanisms or proposals to face globalization, which are the problems that concern the citizenship.
What is important is the content and not the continent (climate change, migration, economic policy, public health, digitalization, artificial intelligence, robotization). Some are cited in the Report of the 12 without going into the slightest detail on how they would be included and articulated in the Treaty except to say that they would be issues that should be decided by qualified majority and not unanimously, without further ado. Why is Brussels going to be accepted to intervene in spatial planning or in the final use of land? Why is Brussels going to intervene in the management and distribution of water? Why is Brussels going to interfere with the energy dispatching of a country, and with the social security that is paid nationally with figures 8/10 times more important than the meager community budget of 1%? Why is it going to fix the salaries, work that the social interlocutors do at national level? And why is Brussels going to deal with the direct taxation of the people or the environmental one by qualified majority when it can condition entire economic sectors? The best thing would be to exclude many of these subjects from the Treaties, expressly if there is a risk of vis expansiva.
When the Report advocates raising the blocking minority from the current 35-odd percent of the population to 40-odd percent (recovering that percentage that Giscard defended in the first instance in the Convention until Spain forced him to lower it to the current 35-odd percent), the reasoning is of supreme cynicism. Thus the 12 say that the big ones would find it more difficult to block in this way. This is unusual because the blocking minorities are designed to protect the small and medium-sized states from the large ones and if the percentage is increased, it will be even more difficult to reach it, which would make it even more difficult for the small and medium-sized states and the small and medium-sized states will not succeed in almost any case in constituting any blocking minority. In short, the minorities would be even more unprotected. Moreover, the large countries almost always vote with small and medium-sized ones.
Spain should defend the opposite, lowering the blocking minority to 29-odd percent of the population, a figure that existed when Sweden, Austria and Finland joined in 1994 (the blocking minority was 29.88% of the votes).
In short, the report of the 12 announces an essentially institutional content, of mechanisms of power that do not represent the interests of all the Member States, especially those of the small and medium-sized ones, much less those of the citizens. In short, it advocates a Giscard II, institutional, without confronting the problems that affect the citizens, those of globalization. We already know how that story ended in disaster and with a final rinse by another Frenchman, Nicolas Sarkozy, chopping up the failed draft Constitution and patching up a new Treaty, that of Lisbon, in his own image and likeness without taking into account the interests of all in a balanced way.
Finally, although it has not been reflected in the Granada Declaration, there is the issue of the resources to finance this enlargement. Many countries, especially those of the North, and the main net contributors, think, and have said so unequivocally in the corridors, that expenditure on cohesion and agriculture would have to be cut sharply, i.e. that the enlargement desired by the richest countries would be paid for by the poorest and most disadvantaged, which is fabulous.
That is why we must carefully analyze the actual launching of the possible enlargement negotiations, so as not to sacrifice the current policies, which are based on the Treaties, demanding an increase in the financing available to cope with enlargement, without accepting any target date that would take away our margin, and be very demanding in defending our national interests with any kind of reforms that they want to submit to us as brilliant panaceas to theoretically solve problems, which by the way we do not have now because many member countries do not give any current priority either to enlargement or to the process of reforming the Treaties. Perhaps, even for France and Germany, they are less important problems than they would have us believe and even uncomfortable if one day we want to find peace with Russia and pacify Ukraine, or the USA decides unilaterally to end the war.
© All rights reserved
