Feed aggregator

Written by Suzana Elena Anghel Gavrilescu and Ralf Drachenberg

The June European Council has a comprehensive list of topics to discuss, including the situation in the Mediterranean, the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP), fighting terrorism, economic governance aspects, and the digital agenda. In addition, a presentation by the British Prime Minister on the future role of the United Kingdom is on the agenda.

Migration is the main topic of this June European Council. Heads of State or Government will discuss the recently published European Agenda for Migration and take stock of the progress made since the extraordinary European Council meeting on migration in April 2015. The European Council will discuss the European Commission’s proposal for a temporary relocation mechanism, which envisages relocating 40 000 persons from Italy and Greece to other Member States.

The European Council should also agree on a new CSDP roadmap and set the objectives for capabilities development, fostering the defence industry and the defence market, and strengthening relations with international organisations (i.e. the UN, NATO, the African Union). The Heads of State or Government will decide on a timeline for the completion of the strategic review process, most probably by June 2016. Within the broader context of discussing security aspects, the European Council will also examine the implementation of the informal February 2015 European Council‘s decisions on the fight against terrorism. 

During discussions on the 2015 European Semester the European Council endorse the Country Specific Recommendations that Member States should implement to ensure sound public finances and to make their economies more competitive. Whilst on the topic of better economic governance in the euro area, the ‘Completing Europe’s Economic and Monetary Union’ report is expected to be presented to the Heads of State or Government.

The European Commission’s recent Digital Single Market strategy for Europe will be tabled for examination, and the European Council will most likely call for a rapid adoption of pending legislation in this field, such as the European Single Market for Electronic Communications, the Directive on Network and Information Security and the proposal for a Regulation on Data Protection.

This European Council meeting will also hear United Kingdom Prime Minister, David Cameron outline his vision for renegotiating his country’s relationship with the EU.

Read the complete ‘Outlook for the European Council of 25 – 26 June 2015‘ in PDF.
Filed under: BLOG, Policy Cycle Tagged: briefings, counter-terrorism strategy, CSDP, digital agenda, economic governance, EPRS briefings, European Council, Pre-European Council Briefing, Ralf Drachenberg, Suzana Elena Anghel Gavrilescu

Ritkán lehet olvasni a honvédség egyik legkisebb missziójáról, az UNIFIL II-ben működő magyar katonai térképészekről. Egy volt szerencsém meglátogatni őket 2010-ben asszem. Már nem tudnűm pontosan felidézni mit mondtak, de annyi megmaradt, hogy a feladatuk, hogy az izraeli-libani határ nagy részét pontosítsák.  Bármilyen érzékeny is a terület, a határ pontosan még nem volt/nincs kijelölve, és ebben a nagyjelentőségű munkában a magyar katonák kulcsszerepet játszanak.
Az ú.n. Blue Line (valamiért ez lett a határ neve történelmileg) pontos kijelölése során az a cél, hogy 50 méreterenként legyen a kék  hordó lerakva. Amikor a térképszek kimérik a pontos helyét, bejelentik a libanoni és izraeli félnek, hogy megvan a pont. Egy megbeszélt időpontban kijön mind a három fél, mindegyik hozza a GPS készülékeit, és árgus szemek kíséretében az ENSZ lerakja a hordót. Nyilván egyetlen négyzetcentiméterről sem mondhat le egyik ország sem a földterületéből, ezért olyan fontos ez.
Sajnos akkor nem volt lehetőség kimenni és megnézni egy ilyet, de remélem a legközelebbi látogatáskor összejön majd. A mi látogatásunk annyira hirtelen és gyors volt, hogy csak a bázison volt idő beszélgetni, meg inni egyet a kávézóban. A februári időjárásnak megfelelően egész nap ömlött az eső.
Miért írok most erről? Mert a Honvédségi Szemlében megjelent egy cikk az UNIFIL II misszióról és a magyar részvételről. Még az is lehet, hogy ezekről is írnak benne (elolvastam már egy hónapja, de nem emlékszem.
Kállai Attila alezredes – Lusták Péter alezredes: Magyar katonai részvétel az ENSZ dél-libanoni békefenntartó missziójában, Honvédségi Szemle 2015/3 
Ez első két kép alán Szidonban készült, de az is lehet, hogy Naqurában, ahol a misszió bázisa is működött. 

Ezek a képek a bázison készültek, kutyafuttában. Ma már emlékeim szerint elköltözött innen a bázis fel a hegyekbe. Ha jó idő volt, pazar lehetett (leszámítva a nagyon párás időt), mert az akkori bázis közvetlenül a tengerparton feküdt. Mivel a misszió akkor olyan 12.000-16.000 főből állt, ezért itt csak a HQ működött szerintem. Az egyes dandároknak meg volt a maguk bázisai bent a Bekaa völgyben.

A költözés oka részben az volt, hogy szűk volt a bázis, és a helikopterekkel ugyan le lehetett szállni de elég szűkösen :)


Car pool

Nem tudom mi  a mostani helyzet, de abban az időben az elhelyezéshangulatos konténerekben történt. Az utolsó képet megnézve látszik, hogy mennyire meredeken emelkedik a vidék. Naqura egyébként a libaoni-izraeli határon fekszik a tengerparton. Az UNIFIL bázis pedig Baqura város déli szélén feküdt, azaz utána már valószínűleg semmi sem jött az izraeli határig.

A UNIFIL II misszió nem csak szárazföldi és "légierő" elemmel rendelkezik, hanem haditengerészetivel is. Az alábbi képeket még Bejrútban lőttem, ahol szerencsémre pont ott létemkor között ki az egyik hadihajó. Egyelőre csak annyit látok, hogy mintha a portugál haditengerészet hajója lenne.

Qui espionne qui et avec quelles méthodes ? "Libération" et Mediapart lèvent le voile sur une réalité ancienne : les États n’ont pas d'amis, juste des intérêts.

Qui espionne qui et avec quelles méthodes ? "Libération" et Mediapart lèvent le voile sur une réalité ancienne : les États n’ont pas d'amis, juste des intérêts.

Elektromajdan – ezzel a hashtaggel terjednek a net orosz nyelvű részén két napja a jereváni tüntetések fotói.

Read more...

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations is embarked on a bold integration initiative that will increasingly align the member states, including through the ASEAN[1] Community to be declared in late 2015 when the region’s leaders meet in Malaysia. The enduring vision and ambition of ASEAN leaders has been the creation of a dynamic, people-centered, inclusive, integrated and globally important collective.

This ambition matters. If ASEAN were a single country, it would be the world’s 7th largest (World Bank 2013 statistics). Or, better still, 4th in World Bank purchasing power parity (PPP) terms. That puts ASEAN just behind the United Kingdom in raw GDP or just behind the combined weight of Germany and the United Kingdom in PPP terms. From 2006-11 ASEAN average growth was 5.14 %, while the EU achieved 1.03 %. Not bad for a region that barely registered in global economic terms before the 1980s.

ASEAN has the world’s 3rd largest population, with over 630 million people. It ranks behind China and India, but ahead of the EU (507 million in 2014) and the United States.   By 2020 around half of the region’s population will be under 30, creating market growth and employment opportunities.   By comparison, in 2014 about one third of the EU’s population was under 30, down from over 40 per cent in 1994 (Eurostat). In 2010 only 5.6 per cent of ASEAN’s people were aged over 65 (EU 18.5 per cent: 2014).   In addition to the population dividend that ASEAN will continue to enjoy, increasing urbanization and rapid uptake of new technology add to the attractiveness of the region as a market and partner.

ASEAN’s drive to integrate has been long in the making.   It was born out of the original wish of the six founding members of ASEAN to work together to ensure the security of their region and to increase the prosperity of their people. Emerging from colonialism and post-war conflicts involving great powers, conscious also that their development levels were low, poverty was endemic, and they had no natural ally, the original members of ASEAN agreed in 1967 to work together for mutual benefit.   Since then the membership has grown, the language and vision have evolved, but the impulse remains the same. ASEAN realizes that their best interests are served by working together to ensure their prosperity and security.

Their current objective is the establishment of an ASEAN Community at the end of year Leaders’ Summit in Malaysia. This comprises three pillars: economic, political-security, socio-cultural.

The economic pillar aims to create a single market and production base, a highly competitive regional economy, equitable economic development to narrow development and wealth gaps, and full integration into the global economy. Many building blocks are in place and others aligned with the blueprint are underway, such as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership free trade negotiations involving ASEAN and its free trade partners (Australia, China, India, Japan, the Republic of Korea and New Zealand).

The political security pillar focuses on a rules-based community with shared values and norms. Some elements relate to political and institutional development within ASEAN. Good governance, human rights and anti-corruption endeavours are among the elements. Others focus on regional interests, like the South China Sea and the implementation of ASEAN’s nuclear free zone. ASEAN already sits at the centre of regional architecture, including through its leadership in the East Asia Summit and the ASEAN Regional Forum, and it wishes to cement this positioning.   There’s also work underway to develop common ASEAN positions on foreign policy issues, but this looks likely to be a long haul endeavour.

The socio-cultural pillar seeks to forge a common identity in a people-centred and socially responsible framework.   The broad-ranging elements include cooperation in areas like education, health, sport, culture, disaster risk management, humanitarian activities, sustainability and science and technology.   Narrowing the development gaps within and between countries features in this pillar, as in the economic one.

ASEAN officials have been working hard to advance the many elements of the overall Community project.   It has long been clear that the 2015 outcome will not be a complete, shining edifice that will transform links among the ASEAN countries and further strengthen their ability to meet the world.   It’s not an EU-style union. Nor at the economic level is it the kind of open partnership in goods, services, investment and labour that New Zealand and Australia have achieved.   Such comparisons ultimately miss the point.

ASEAN is forging its own unique set of arrangements that will bind its members ever more closely, while recognizing the massive differences among them not only in economic and development terms, but also in matters of language, culture and confidence. They looked at other models, but are shaping their own course at a pace and in a direction that works for them.   The progress they achieve with small, often over-worked bureaucracies is remarkable.   The 2015 outcome will reflect the start of the next phase of their journey – they will improve, tweak and nuance it over time. In short, the ASEAN Community represents a milestone, rather than a destination, in the long journey of regional integration.

Indeed, ASEAN has already begun talking about their next vision looking beyond 2020. That determination to keep moving, to keep improving, is a powerful driver for a region that does not want to be left behind and which aspires to have an ever more significant global presence.

To be sure there are challenges and problems that ASEAN must confront.

The Asia-Pacific region remains one of critical strategic significance. It has benefitted from the leading role the United States has played in supporting peace and prosperity. China’s rapid recent development has also presented fresh opportunities for ASEAN. Yet the current South China Sea debate highlights evolution in the regional dynamic. ASEAN recognizes that it needs to remain nimble, cohesive and neutral in the wider context if it is to remain at the heart of regional processes. As Indonesia’s former foreign minister Marty Natalegawa used to say, ASEAN has to earn its place in the driver’s seat of regionalism.

Within ASEAN there are challenges also. In integration terms, for example, labour mobility is currently a long term dream for most. Then there are various bilateral issues that create awkwardness among certain member states from time to time. And despite the commitment of their leaders to ASEAN, they are still working on getting the region’s people to fully embrace the notion that ASEAN should now be part of their DNA (Europe faces a similar challenge). And so on.

At its core, gradual evolutionary improvement in every facet of life and activity within the ASEAN community will make those countries stronger, with higher levels of development, improved regulation, stronger economies and fewer challenges. That will heighten their attractiveness as partners. Along the way, there will also be greater opportunities to work with ASEAN to help the grouping achieve its vision in each of the three pillar areas.   Each external dialogue partner, including the EU, is already deeply engaged in helping ASEAN in areas where there are skills and capabilities to share.   This creates an excellent base for further development of existing relationships and partnerships and the development of new ones. The EU has in fact just decided to take its relationship with ASEAN to a “strategic level”.

ASEAN is rising, quickly. The integration initiative takes account of regional realities, needs and aspirations and is unique – it does not parallel other integration efforts in other regions. It has set the grouping on a course that will have far-reaching consequences.   The opportunities for partnership and deeper engagement will increase over time as ASEAN progresses its integration project.     May ASEAN continue to have bold dreams.

[1] ASEAN members include Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand). Vietnam joined in 1995, Laos and Burma in 1997, and Cambodia in 1999.

 

IMAGE CREDIT: CC / FLICKR – Prachatai

The post With integration comes opportunity: the ASEAN story appeared first on Europe’s World.

A mother holds her child outside a migration centre in Rome last week

Brussels may be obsessed with the prospect of Grexit, and much of the focus of the two-day EU summit that starts on Thursday may be Brexit. But the issue worrying many EU diplomats going into the summit is something else entirely: migration.

For the first time, a draft conclusions sent around to national capitals on Monday (we have posted a copy here) includes language on how leaders will deal with the massive influx of refugees from North Africa. If you’ll recall, an emergency summit held in April explicitly left out any targets for numbers of refugees washing up on Italian and Greek shores that would be “relocated” in other EU countries.

Then the European Commission decided it would propose 40,000 of those refugees would be relocated and even came up with European schemes for relocation and resettlement (pdf) that divvied up how many each country would accept. National capitals were not too pleased with that.

The European Commission seems relatively happy with the new draft communiqué. The figures — 40,000 people, over two years — are still there. Likewise, the call for “rapid adoption” — perhaps at a meeting next month — of their migration proposals is stronger than some within the Berlaymont had feared.

But the conclusions do not mention the word “mandatory”, which has raised red flags since many fear that without resettlement quotas, countries will be hard pressed to avoid political pressure to keep refugees out. But it should be noted that the original proposals didn’t mention the word “mandatory”, either.

Read more

Source : © European Union, 2015 - EP

There is now a long list of conflicts and security threats that affect Europe directly or indirectly. As well as Ukraine, the list includes Syria, Iraq, Libya, Egypt, the Central African Republic, South Sudan, Somalia, Nigeria, Mali, Yemen, Afghanistan and Pakistan. This list isn’t exhaustive, but it highlights the worsening international security situation, and for EU countries it means an increased terrorism risk, waves of people trying to escape the horrors of war and a need for more humanitarian aid than ever.

Europe’s number one security concern, of course, is Russian aggression in Ukraine. The Russia-Ukraine conflict, and the reaction of democratic societies to it, has gone through several phases. With the benefit of hindsight, one might well say the EU lacked effectiveness in the pre-conflict period. Before the Vilnius summit in November 2013, there had been no EU consensus on whether to conclude an Association Agreement with Ukraine. EU governments either didn’t want to commit themselves to a European perspective for Ukraine, or were using the imprisonment of Yulia Tymoshenko as an excuse. The real reason for the delay was an unwillingness to take the step forward with Ukraine that the association agreement would have meant. And by the time they finally reached agreement it was too late. Russian pressure on Ukraine had become so great that the then president Viktor Yanukovytch didn’t dare to sign the agreement with the EU. The moment had passed, and the world knows what happened once the Maidan protests began.

“We in Estonia, and in other Baltic states, must clearly understand that in this tense situation we must be able to make choices that are free of external pressures”

Yanukovytch was ousted and Russia began its military aggression in Ukraine to prevent the country from moving westwards and away from Russia´s sphere of influence. Russia basically repeated the events of 2008 when it attacked Georgia and fostered ‘breakaway’ governments in the frozen conflict regions of South-Ossetia and Abkhazia with the aim of dashing Georgia’s hopes of NATO membership.

The illegal annexation of Crimea by Russia in March 2014 prompted Europe along with democratic countries elsewhere to adopt a fundamentally more active stance towards the Ukraine crisis. At first, European sanctions were imposed. But the essence of the conflict had yet really to make an impact on public opinion in western Europe. The Ukraine conflict tended to be seen as merely another example of slavic bickering that had little or nothing to do with western Europe. It took a horrible tragedy to change that; for this war reached western consciousness last July, when Malaysian Airline’s Flight MH17 was shot down with the loss of all its passengers and crew. The shift in European public opinion was such that suddenly Estonia and other like-minded countries were no longer seen as “Russophobic”.

NATO took steps to strengthen security on its eastern wing, and the NATO-Russia Council was suspended. Additional planes had already been sent by the U.S. in March to strengthen the protection of Baltic airspace, and in April NATO decided to step up security, with Estonia’s Ämari airport to become the base for Baltic air policing. By the beginning of May, Ämari had become host to Danish fighter jets, which were replaced at the end of August by German planes. With U.S. army units now permanently based in Estonia, the clear message is that NATO is a well-functioning security organisation.

When President Barack Obama visited Tallinn in early last September, he made it plain that protecting Tallinn, Riga and Vilnius is as important as protecting Berlin, Paris and London. Shortly afterwards, the NATO summit in Wales was being hailed as a success in Estonia because it defined the alliance’s reinforced presence in our region as the ‘new normal’.

The unconcealed presence of Russian troops in Eastern Ukraine by the end of August last year finally made the EU act more forcefully. This mostly took the form of strengthened sanctions against Russia, and it will take time for these to have an effect. Unfortunately, there are not many alternatives to sanctions when political and diplomatic efforts have brought no success.

“There can be no political solution in Ukraine if that were to mean permanent new areas of frozen conflict”

We must keep on trying to find a political solution to the crisis, but that will be difficult as long as Russia continues preventing Ukraine or any other former Soviet Union country from moving closer to either the EU or NATO, and tries to either keep them or bring them back into its own sphere of influence. The EU’s sanctions should therefore not be lifted until the reasons for those sanctions have disappeared, which does not seem likely to happen any time soon. On the contrary, fighting continues in eastern Ukraine, there have been reports of human rights violations in Crimea and in both hundreds of thousands of people have fled from their homes.

These developments make it all the more embarrassing to hear some EU leaders call for the lifting of sanctions and a return to business as usual. The EU cannot afford to be split, while the trend towards closer co-operation between Moscow and both far left and far right populist parties in Europe is alarming, especially when financial support is involved. And there are already many members of the European Parliament whose views are clearly influenced by Russia.

There can be no political solution in Ukraine if that were to mean permanent new areas of frozen conflict. Both Crimea and Donbas are already in that situation because of Russia’s activities. Of six EU partnership countries, five have either one frozen conflict and sometimes even two; South-Ossetia and Abkhazia, in Georgia, Moldova has Transnistria, Armenia and Azerbaijan have Nagorno-Karabakh and now Ukraine has Crimea and Donbas. Russia’s purpose in creating these frozen conflict areas is to influence the choices open to these countries.

The communiqué issued after NATO’s Newport summit in Wales noted that Russia´s aggressive actions against Ukraine fundamentally challenge the vision of a Europe whole, free and at peace. This kind of message would have been unthinkable a year before. Russia had previously been treated as a partner, but its use of military force against a neighbour and the forceful changing of a country’s borders as a means for dealing with disagreements has created a new situation. The security policy positions of Estonia and likeminded countries have thus become the mainstream of European security thinking.

In light of all this, one might ask whether the crisis has led to the collapse of Europe’s security architecture. For 20 years Europe has built a system relying on security collaboration with its underlying principles of refraining from either threatening or using force, of respect for national sovereignty and territorial integrity, the inviolability of borders, and the right of states to choose freely their allies. These principles are contained in the UN Charter and in such underlying documents of European security as the CSCE’s Helsinki Final Act and the Charter of Paris, and also in the Founding Act on NATO-Russia relations.

“The EU’s sanctions should not be lifted until the reasons for those sanctions have disappeared, which does not seem likely to happen any time soon”

Russia violated these principles when its troops set foot in Ukraine. But that violation does not necessarily mean the end of Europe’s security architecture. A violation of agreed principles doesn’t make them automatically null and void, for this crisis has both unified and strengthened Europe. But even if the basic principles of that architecture still apply, the security environment has clearly changed. Borders have been changed by force and the predictability of international relations has been seriously reduced.

We in Estonia, and in other Baltic states, must clearly understand that in this tense situation we must be able to make choices that are free of external pressures. Our EU and NATO membership has given us the sense of security we never had before. Yet countries in our neighbourhood have had to experience such Russian actions as constant airspace violations in Finland and Sweden, the dangerous manoeuvres of Russian warplanes in the European airspace, the re-opening of charges against Lithuanian nationals who refused to join the Soviet army or the abduction from Estonian territory of police officer Eston Kohver and his unlawful detainment in Russia.

So what future actions are open to Europe? We have been accustomed to seeing the EU in the positive light of a soft power. In many parts of Europe, theis perspective has led old enemies to accept and respect each other. Europe faced almost no external opposition to its enlargement processes, let alone to its association agreements. But now that Europe’s soft power has clashed in Ukraine with Russian hard power, a whole new situation has been created that we must adjust to.

Europe values the sanctity of human life, the liberty of individual, including freedom of expression and conscience, the comprehensive protection of human rights, democracy and compliance with agreements. But to the east of our neighbourhood there are powers that question these values. Freedom of expression, including internet freedom, is being suppressed by various means and free media replaced by propaganda. The interests of state administration are more important than private property rights, so we are entering a new phase of ideological confrontation. On the one side there are the democratic values on which our prosperity is built, and on the other a “civil religion” that gives priority to the interests of the authorities. We in the EU and NATO know which is the right side to be on.

 

IMAGE CREDIT: CC / FLICKR – George Layne

The post The Ukraine crisis is a threat to Europe’s security architecture appeared first on Europe’s World.

Earlier this month, at the Bakony Combat Training Centre in Hungary, the European Defence Agency attended exercise Capable Logistician 15. The event was coordinated by the Multinational Logistic Coordination Centre (MLCC) and supported by Hungary as host nation. Capable Logistician 15 provided the EDA with an opportunity to test its Sharing of Spare Parts (SoSP) mechanism and to prove the effectiveness of its operational procedures.

Sharing of Spare Parts (SoSP) is an initiative aimed at establishing a multinational framework for the request and provision of Mutual Logistic Support (MLS) in peacetime and during the execution of operations. MLS focuses on unforeseen and temporary shortages of common supplies as well as on in-service support for standard or specific equipment.

In this respect, Capable Logistician 15 offered a realistic scenario in which to simulate the lack of an appropriate level of logistic support - which in turn may have affected the operational effectiveness of a unit in the field. The unavailability of spare parts (in this simulated event, a transmission gear for land vehicles) has often caused serious problems in operations, especially where there is a particularly long logistic chain, where there are security considerations, or where similar collaborative solutions are not feasible or convenient.

The simulated application of the SoSP scheme allowed the exchange of spare parts between two units in the field which were using the same land vehicles.

More information

• Exercise Capable Logistician 2015
• Sharing of Spare Parts project page

 

/ Dans les Balkans, Serbie

/ Dans les Balkans, Serbie

Több ezer ember tüntetett hétfő este az örmény fővárosban az áram árának jelentős emelése ellen. A tüntetők egy része és a rendőrség között összetűzés alakult ki, több mint kétszáz embert őrizetbe vettek.

A menet az elnöki palotához tartott, de nem jutott el oda, mert rohamrendőrök és vízágyúk az útját állták. Ekkor a demonstrálók leültek az utca kövére, és a rendőrség többszöri felszólítása ellenére sem mozdultak, akadályozva a forgalmat. Hajnalban a rendőrség úgy döntött, hogy feloszlatja a tömeget, amely ekkor már csak néhány száz fős volt. Összecsapások törtek ki, amelyekben 18 ember, köztük 11 rendőr megsebesült. Három sérült állapota súlyos. A rendőrök 237 tüntetőt őrizetbe vettek.

A demonstrálók azt követelték, hogy a kormány vizsgálja felül azt a döntését, miszerint 17-22 százalékkal növeli a háztartási elektromos áram árát.

"Bármely, a líbiai vizeken előzetes engedély vagy együttműködés nélkül hajózó vízi járművet harci repülőgépekkel veszünk célba" - mondta a líbiai légierő parancsnoka.

Un marin est porté disparu à la mer, moins de quatre mois après un épisode semblable.