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The EU is not foreign policy any more



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The EU (or rather, the EEC) started out as a way for countries to cooperate, and of course it was run by foreign ministers.

Over time, other ministers have got more and more involved, but the foreign ministers have remained very powerful.

However, Lisbon has abolished that, and the efficient Swedish presidency are now shutting out the foreign ministers:

Swedish foreign minister Carl Bildt on Thursday (10 December) dismissed criticism from some of his EU counterparts for implementing a Lisbon Treaty novelty that sees foreign ministers excluded from EU summits. […]

But Mr Bildt defended his actions: “The Lisbon Treaty is in place since 1 December and until 31 December I will be very fundamentalist in implementing it.”

He explained that since the treaty came into force, relations between member states are no longer considered “foreign policy” but are now “domestic policy” and so EU leaders no longer need their top diplomats beside them.

I think this is a positive development, but it’s not going to be very popular in the foreign ministries!

One thought on “The EU is not foreign policy any more

  • francis Codjoe

    The unknown truth is that the Lisbon Treaty paves the way for a Briton’s prediction about ther future of Europe to be fulfilled. This British Secret Service Agent wrote about EU how it would develop, its character and future prospects even before Jean Monnet and Robert Schuman – the Founding fathers iof EU – were born in 1888 and 1886.
    EU politicians especially the French, should not gl;oag about EU’s achievement. The EU Titanic was destined to sink even before it wsarchitect was born. “Verbum sapientis est”

    Reply

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