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EU: Strong lobby in EP for Eurobomb

01 July 1996

The European Parliament's (EP) foreign and security commission, packed with senior European politicians, has argued for a "common defence policy and a common system of deterrence" in a report drafted at the end of May. In a public drafting session the commission made it clear that the deterrent envisaged would be nuclear. The intention was to take over weapons now used by Britain and France. "Without [them] the union will never be able to adopt a foreign and security policy," the document said. MEPs who voted in favour included Otto von Habsburg and Leo Tindemans. The chairman, Abel Matutes Juan recently became Spain's Foreign Minister. In the plenary session of the EP the paragraph was amended so that the word "deterrence" was no longer mentioned and the importance of preventing conflicts and a European peace force stressed. However the amended version was only narrowly accepted. The episode in the commission was in the words of the eurosceptic Tory MP James Cran "an indication of the direction that very powerful forces in the EP wish us to take." In the meantime in another draft-report that is coming up for the commission, rapporteur Leo Tindemans writes that France and the UK should think in the future about putting their nuclear forces at disposal of the protection of the EU and should in the meantime consider already coordinating their nuclear submarine patrols. Sunday Telegraph, 2.6.96; Resolution of the European Parliament on the progress made in the implementation of the common foreign and security policy (January - December 1995), A4-0175/96, Leo Tindemans, Draft report on the security and defence policy of the European Union, 11.6.96