Senior representatives of the EU’s member states and of Catherine Ashton, the Union’s foreign policy chief, have been meeting senior MEPs, urging them to back a blueprint for the EU’s diplomatic service.
EU leaders are supposed to take a formal decision to launch the European External Action Service (EEAS) in June. But MEPs have threatened to withhold their consent from decisions that are required for the EEAS to function if their demands are not met. MEPs want Ashton to have deputies who are politically accountable – a demand rejected by most member states – and to have full budgetary oversight over its operations. A senior official working with Ashton said the latter demand was “not an issue”.
On Tuesday (27 April), Miguel Ángel Moratinos, the foreign minister of Spain, which currently holds the rotating presidency of the Council of Ministers, had informal talks with MEPs. Carlos Bastarreche Sagües, Spain’s permanent representative to the EU, held a meeting with the Parliament’s rapporteurs on the EEAS – Guy Verhofstadt, a Belgian Liberal MEP, and Elmar Brok, a German centre-right MEP – Catherine Day, the secretary-general of the European Commission, and Poul Skytte Christoffersen, Ashton’s adviser on the EEAS.
The consultations came hours after EU foreign ministers endorsed Ashton’s plans for the EEAS on Monday (26 April). The ministers’ discussions in Luxembourg lasted four hours but ended with agreement on a text that is now being used for negotiations with MEPs.
The member states endorsed Ashton’s revised plan for a three-member management board developing the service’s policies and running its operations.