Jack Wall
Ceist:58 Mr. Wall asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs the analysis, if any, he has carried out of the responsibilities towards Ireland's European partners as the security and defence environment develops. [9431/99]
Written Answers. - Security and Defence Environment.
The developing European security and defence environment is under constant review and analysis within the Department of Foreign Affairs. Within the EU context, a significant development is that the Amsterdam Treaty came into force on 1 May of this year. Under that treaty, the EU has agreed that the progressive framing of a common defence policy now falls within the remit of the Common Foreign and Security Policy. In this connection, the EU has agreed to develop a role in humanitarian and rescue tasks, peacekeeping tasks and tasks of combat forces in crisis management, including peacekeeping. These are the Petersberg tasks.
There has been regular and ongoing discussion within the EU and Western European Union, where Ireland is represented as an observer, of how to ensure that the Amsterdam Treaty's mechanisms in relation to the Petersberg tasks work most effectively. I have underlined to my EU colleagues the importance of making effective use of the treaty's mechanisms on the Petersberg tasks, and am glad that there is a general view among EU partners that the EU's priority should be effective conflict prevention, peacekeeping and crisis management.
The Vienna European Council in December last invited the German Presidency to further the debate on how the European Union can best ensure effective responses to the kinds of crises that we have seen in areas such as the Balkans in recent years. The European Council will review matters at its meeting in Cologne in June on the basis of a progress report by the German Presidency, and in light of the agreement by NATO at its summit last month to make available NATO assets to support EU Petersberg tasks. I also believe that the European Union will have to take account of the lessons learnt from the Kosovo situation. The European Union will continue its consideration of these matters after the Cologne Summit.