European Union

Delegations

Source : © European Union, 2018 - EP

Ministerio Fiscal
DFON
Advocate General Saugmandsgaard Øe proposes that the Court should find that even criminal offences that are not particularly serious may justify disclosure of basic electronic communications metadata provided such disclosure does not seriously undermine the right to privacy

OTP Bank and OTP Faktoring
Environment and consumers
According to Advocate General Tanchev, a Member State legislative response to a ruling of the Court of Justice concerning the unfairness of contractual terms for lack of clarity is judicially reviewable

This Saturday 5 May, the European Defence Agency (EDA) participates in the 'EU Open Day'. Pass by and meet the EDA staff at information stand 32 in the building of the European External Action Service (EEAS) at Rond Point Schuman in Brussels.

Every year, the European Union celebrates peace and unity on 'Europe Day'. The event marks the anniversary of the 'Schuman Declaration', outlining a vision to unite separate European states into a single community.The public is invited to visit the main European institutions in Brussels on 5 May.

For more information on the celebrations in Brussels, click here.

EU Open Day at the European External Action Service

• Time: Open from 10.00 till 18.00 
• Address: EEAS Building, 9A Rond Point Schuman, 1000 Brussels

Source : © European Union, 2018 - EP

Plenary Session - Brussels

Source : © European Union, 2018 - EP

Bulgaria, who holds the Presidency of the Council of the EU during this semester, hosted the second European Advanced Airlift Tactics Training Courses (ETAP-C) from April 15th to 27th. This two-week comprehensive airlift tactics training course aims to enhance interoperability between European Air Forces. The participating crews were trained within a simulated theatre-deployment setting, exposing them to a complex surface-to-air and air-to-air threat environment, within which they were tasked to conduct demanding airlift missions.

At the end of the course, 3 graduating crews received a certificate reflecting the training objectives achieved.

EDA initiated the European Tactical Airlift Programme (ETAP) to develop innovative, efficient and more effective approaches to overcome Advanced Airlift Tactical Training and Interoperability shortfalls, within the European Air Transport Fleet (EATF) programme.

ETAP aims to enhance European transport airlift operational capability for crisis management operations through the pooling and sharing of experience, training opportunities and organisational costs, and the development of agreed common tactics, techniques and procedures, to better meet the challenges of flying transport aircraft in a joint and combined modern operational environment.

The organisational and administrative responsibilities for the ETAP have recently been handed over to the European Tactical Airlift Centre (ETAC) in Zaragoza, Spain, which was opened in June 2017 in the presence of EU High Representative and Head of the EDA Federica Mogherini, the Spanish Minister of Defence María Dolores de Cospedal and EDA Chief Executive Jorge Domecq.

This multinational centre, which was established with the support of 10 EDA Member States (Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Portugal and Spain) and one Third State (Norway), delivers European Advanced Airlift Tactics Training Courses (ETAP-C), European Airlift Transport Training (ETAP-T), European Advanced Tactical Instructor Course (ETAP-I), Symposia (ETAP-S) and any other ETAP related activities for military air transport personnel.

The 2018 activities began in January at the International Training Centre (ITC) in Pisa, Italy, with the first three ETAP-I. The first ETAP-C took place in Zaragoza from February 18th until March 3d, with nine crews and six aircraft (2 C-130, 1 C-160, 1 CASA 235 and 2 CASA 295) from Germany, The Netherlands, Belgium, France and Spain. This course was divided in two parts, day and night, with some of the crews attending the night course using night-vision goggles.

International interest in ETAC activities is tangible, with observers from Finland, Bulgaria and the Emirates participating in the January course. NATO AWACS observers from Geilenkirchen also attended to investigate the possibility of joining this type of training in the future.
 

More information

• EATT17 closes with advanced tactical airlift operations (EDA news, June 2017)

 

Committee meetings, Brussels

Source : © European Union, 2018 - EP

On 19th of April, 21 students from 8 Member States graduated from the first EDA Defence Energy Managers Course (DEMC). The DEMC aims at increasing energy efficiency and reducing energy consumption in the military domain through the application of defence-specific Energy Management Systems (EnMSs) based on the ISO 50001 standard.  The DEMC is the first of its kind to be run at multi-national level and to deliver both theoretical and practical EnMS training to energy managers from European navies, armies and air forces.  

The implementation of EnMSs under DEMC resulted in saving around 2,5 GWh of energy consumed, reaching normalised reductions in energy consumptions of up to 25.2%.

The course was split into 5 distinct modules (3 classroom-type and two practical of total duration of 12 months) with this first pilot run launched in April 2017. Participants improved their know-how on the complexities of managing energy within a defence organisation. They were also able to acquire the capacity to structure, implement and improve effective EnMSs and to enhance their skills thanks to on-going mentoring, alumni relations and membership in the European Defence Energy Network (EDEN) with permanent access to its established on-line resources.

The DEMC marks another important milestone in EDA’s approach to sustainability in defence and fulfils the level of ambition of the EDA Member States for capacity building in energy management, already identified through the first round of the Consultation Forum for Sustainable Energy in the Defence and Security Sector (sponsored by the European Commission) and the EDA’s own Energy and Environmental Working Group, developing  mainstream sustainability concepts within the defence sector as enablers for improved military capability and reduced environmental footprint of military activities.
 

Background

The course began with a 5-day classroom-type session (module 1) to guide the participants with the framework and requirements of ISO 50001 EnMS standard and to familiarise them with energy data analysis techniques. Then followed a 6-month mentoring session (module 2) on the development of the core structure of the EnMSs to be applied, including visits at participating Member States’ sites, webinars and extensive one-on-one mentoring. It was followed by module 3 (3-day classroom type session) which, besides reviewing the progress made so far, further elaborated on the EnMS requirements especially related to training, design, procurement, operations (including deployments). The subsequent 5-month mentoring session (module 4), included site visits, during which energy internal audits were  conducted, coupled with further support though webinars and tailored guidance. The concluding 3-day classroom type module (module 5) focused on reviewing the developed EnMSs and providing further guidance on operational control issues related to energy.

The pilot run of the Defence Energy Managers’ Course (DEMC – Pilot) was attended by MoD / Armed Forces’ personnel from Belgium, Germany, Greece, Italy, Portugal, Romania, Sweden and The  Netherlands. During this pilot course, the EnMS concept was developed and is currently applied at 10 military installations of diverse uses (from military academies to armoured vehicles’ camps and naval depos).

With such a successful outcome of the DEMC - Pilot, up to 6 steady state DEMC could be envisaged over the next 3 years. The steady state courses will build upon the pilot course taking into account gained experience, recommendations and feedback from participating Member States. 

The project is delivered by GEN Europe and the Centre for Renewable Energy Sources & Savings (CRES). It is run by the European Defence Agency’s Innovative Research Unit.
 

More information: 

• Defence Energy Managers' Course Holds First Session 
• New Defence Energy Managers Course Launched

 [AN1]http://eda.europa.eu/info-hub/press-centre/latest-news/2017/04/24/defence-energy-managers'-course-holds-first-session

 [AN2]http://eda.europa.eu/info-hub/press-centre/latest-news/2017/01/20/new-defence-energy-managers-course-launched

 

   

From January 1, 2019, the Russian Volga will cease providing AN-124 capacity for EU and NATO states under NATO's heavy military air transport program SALIS (Strategic Airlift Interim Solution), which includes 17 European member states and Canada. The loss is sensitive: Under Salis, Antonov and Volga have each had an AN-124 permanently stationed at Leipzig-Halle Airport since March 2006, with additional uplift available at short notice.

Unfortunately, the SALIS Program Office did not succeed in overcoming the Russian withdrawal, despite the long negotiations. The move comes just over a year after the Russian freighter operator announced the end of the near-decade-long Russlan collaboration to market AN-124 capacity with Ukraine’s Antonov. A move thought to be in response to western sanctions on Russian companies. Negotiations conducted by the Salis steering board last week failed to avert the withdrawal. After Volga-Dnepr subsidiary AirBridgeCargo lost about half its 21 landing slots at Schiphol last year, Russia reportedly threatened to ban Dutch carriers from its airspace. Shortly after, KLM struck a deal with ABC over additional slots.

The ending of the Salis contract puts pressure on NATO and the EU, which need access to the world’s largest commercial cargo aircraft. This is a serious loss of capacity: the Ukrainian An-124s of Antonov's air transport industry are only flying 900 flights per year - the largest fleet with two Russian aircraft has been available to SALIS's designers for up to 2300 hours per year.

There is always the possibility that the withdrawal is part of a larger play by Volga-Dnepr president Alexey Isaikin, who is looking to set up a German cargo airline, with AN-124s registered in Germany, at Leipzig. By registering an AN-124 to a German company, the Volga-Dnepr group would no longer be caught in the crossfire of political skirmishes between Russia and elsewhere, which includes problems with Antonov maintenance. And as an EU company, it might get preferential treatment for military shipments over Ukraine’s Antonov. It also adds pressure on Germany, which is keen to develop Leipzig-Halle as a freight airport, to OK the new airline’s AOC and aircraft registration. (Although as one source told The Loadstar, Lufthansa Cargo was unlikely to welcome a new freighter airline on its doorstep, and would “go ape-shit”.)

Tag: SALISVolga-Dnepr

EDA's "European Funding Gateway for Defence" (EFGD) now provides defence stakeholders with guidance on European funding available for Circular Economy, REACH-related substitution of hazardous chemical substances, Energy and Environmental Management in Defence.

Our comprehensive funding gateway has been updated with information on grants, loans and risk capital available for the Defence sector under the following EU Programmes:

• LIFE,
• Cohesion Fund (ESIF) and
• ELENA (Horizon 2020 - as deployed by the European Investment Bank).

 
More information:

• European Funding Gateway for Defence
• COSME platform
• Industry portal

 

The International Conference on Cyber Defence – Building a Rapid Response will be held in the Central Military Club, Sofia, Bulgaria, from 13 to 14 June 2018. This event is co-organised by the Bulgarian EU Presidency and the European Defence Agency (EDA).

The aim of the Conference is to highlight the requirements and solutions for a rapid response to cyber defence crises and how the associated challenges can be met through different research and technology, education, training and exercises initiatives at EU level.

The conference will offer an excellent knowledge-sharing opportunity within the gathering of representatives from governments, EU, academia, Armed Forces, industry, and innovation centers.

The conference will comprise presentations on operational challenges together with presentations by industry start-ups, small to medium sized enterprises (SMEs), cyber defence companies, government structures, and academic institutions.  The topics to be discussed will be related with the following thematic areas:

• setting the requirements for rapid response
• rapid response solutions
• research and innovation on cyber cefence
• training, developing and exercising a Rapid Response Force
• cross-sectorial cooperation on EU civil-military synergies
• the new EU Cyber Defence Education, Training, Exercise and Evaluation Platform 
  
  

Call for papers 

A call for papers on topics of interest has been published here. Accepted papers will be presented at the conference.

For more detailed information, please visit the Conference website.

 

Plenary session - Strasbourg

Source : © European Union, 2018 - EP

Source : © European Union, 2018 - EP

The SME Corner at the EDA website has been redesigned to make it an even more comprehensive and reader-friendly source of information on EDA defence industry related matters for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and SME-policy makers. 

The new SME Corner has two main building blocks: (1) industry opportunities and (2) government opportunities. Among many other things, interested parties can find there valuable information about how to get involved in European defence research and capability development as well as guidance and practical advice on how to benefit from existing EDA cooperation opportunities or access EU funding. The SME Corner will be updated and refreshed continuously in order to keep pace with upcoming initiatives of interest to the SME community.
 

Background: EDA and SMEs

In line with its new approach on industry engagement approved in May 2017, EDA continuously works on topics relevant to SMEs which are the backbone of Europe’s economy and therefore of strategic importance. SMEs count for about 99% of Europe’s businesses and of each euro of added value created in the EU, 58 cents can be attributed to SMEs. Since SMEs are equally important for all EDA Member States, all of them share a common interest in utilizing SME’s innovative and competitive potential for improving Europe’s defence capabilities.

In operational terms, EDA seeks mainly to:

• tap into the innovation potential of SMEs and harvest it for the sake of developing, maintaining and using defence capabilities;
• facilitate cross-border cooperation among industry in defence research and capability development;
• create new opportunities for industry to build supply chains across Europe;
• strengthen the competitiveness of the European Defence Technological and Industrial Base (EDTIB) in general, and of the SMEs in particular.

 

EDA Chief Executive Jorge Domecq arrived in Berne on 10 April for a two days working visit. During the visit, Mr Domecq has met with Nathalie Falcone-Goumaz, Secretary-General of the Federal Department of Defence, Civil Protection and Sport, Martin Sonderegger, the National Armaments Director, as well as other high-level representatives of the national administration, defence industry and universities. Discussions focused on Switzerland’s current and potential future contributions to EDA projects and programmes as well as on the latest defence initiatives on EU level. This was a follow up to Mr Domecq's meeting with the Swiss Minister of Defence that took place in the margins of the Munich Security Conference on 16 February 2018. 

Switzerland concluded a framework for cooperation with the European Defence Agency (EDA) in 2012 enabling it to participate in EDA projects and programmes on a case by case basis. Mr Domecq welcomed the opportunity to discuss EDA initiatives with representatives from the Federal Department of Defence, Civil Protection and Sport, Armasuisse as well as the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs. Further discussions were held with representatives of the Swiss defence industry, research institutes and universities. 

The meeting with Secretary-General Falcone-Goumaz included discussions on the general state of play of the Implementation Plan on Security and Defence of the EU Global Strategy including the Coordinated Annual Review on Defence (CARD), the Permanent Structured Cooperation on security and defence (PESCO) and the European Defence Fund, with focus of the discussions on EDA's role in all three initiatives. 

National Armaments Director Martin Sonderegger and Jorge Domecq further conferred over Switzerland’s contributions to EDA work. Recently, Switzerland joined an innovative research & technology project in the land domain (PASEI - Protection of Autonomous Systems Against Enemy Interference). An additional project in the area of CBRN and Human Factors is under consideration. Switzerland has also demonstrated interest in participating in EDA's Capability Technolgy Groups as well as on activities where EDA acts as a military interface to EU policies such as on chemicals (REACH), Single European Sky or energy topics. Other possible areas for cooperation investigated were on cyber as well as opportunities in the land sector. 

 

More information:

• Press release Armasuisse

On 10 and 11 April 2018 the kick-off meeting of the OCEAN2020 project is held at the European Defence Agency (EDA). More than 70 representatives from the 42 consortium partners participate in the meeting. OCEAN2020 is the largest of the three projects selected in the 2017 call for proposals for the EU Preparatory Action on Defence Research (PADR).

OCEAN2020’s main objective is to support maritime surveillance and interdiction missions at sea. In this regard the project will integrate enhanced air, naval surface and underwater unmanned systems into fleet operations to build up a recognised maritime picture of developing situations for military commanders.

The project is run by a consortium led by Leonardo S.p.A, bringing together 42 partners from 15 EU countries. The total amount of the grant is €35.5 million funded by the European Union. During his opening address, Jorge Domecq, EDA Chief Executive stressed the importance of the project to demonstrate the importance of cooperative defence research for Europe. 

The two-day meeting is dedicated to discussing programmatic and technical activities of the project. A large set of deliverables are foreseen to be prepared within six months and all the actors demonstrate a broad commitment to achieve this first milestone. The discussions are geared to consolidate a solid modus operandi in order to coordinate such a big group of experts from all over Europe and from different organisations. The second day is entirely dedicated to the presentation of the technical activities in the six work packages composing the project.

During the project two live demonstrations will be conducted in combination with operational military exercises – one in the Mediterranean sea led by the Italian navy in 2019 and one in the Baltic sea in 2020 led by the Swedish navy.
 

Background

The Preparatory Action on Defence Research (PADR) is funded by the European Union. The PADR activities are run by  the European Defence Agency (EDA) following the mandate of a Delegation Agreement between the Commission and EDA signed on 31st May 2017. By this agreement  the Commission entrusts EDA with the management and implementation of the research projects to be launched within the PADR.
The PADR is a concrete step aimed at assessing and demonstrating the added-value of EU supported defence research and technology (R&T). The relevant results are expected to further deepen European defence cooperation, addressing capability shortfalls, and to strengthen European defence stakeholders.

The European Commission launched the PADR with a view of developing a future European Defence Research Programme (EDRP) as part of the EU’s next Multiannual Financial Framework (2021-2027).
 

More information:

• Preparatory Action on Defence Research (PADR) - EDA project page
• European Commission press release (16 Feb 2018) 

The 5th European Air-to-Air Refuelling Training exercise (EART 2018) kicked off today 9 April at Eindhoven Air Base in the Netherlands. EART 2018 brings together tankers from Germany, the Netherlands, France and - for the first time - from a non-European country, the United States, for a two week training exercise ending on 20 April. 

The European Air-to-Air Refuelling Training (EART) concept was introduced in 2014 under the European Defence Agency’s (EDA) air-to-air refuelling initiative, and is run by the European Air Transport Command (EATC) from Eindhoven airbase. The exercise is supported by the host nation (the Netherlands), the Eindhoven-based Movement Coordination Centre Europe (MCCE) and EDA. 

EART is organised on a yearly basis in combination with the ‘Frisian Flag’ fighter training exercise, also organized by the Netherlands, that operates from Leeuwarden Airbase. The objective is to train air crews and engineers in planning and executing complex air-to-air refuelling (AAR) operations in a multinational and realistic COMAO (composite air operation) environment, with the overall aim of enhancing effectiveness and interoperability of forces. A particular focus is also put on facilitating the certification processes between tankers and receiver aircraft. The exercise director for EART 2018 is Colonel Andrea Massucci (Italian Air Force).

 

Eindhoven for two weeks “tanker town of Europe”

AAR is a significant force enabler and multiplier as it enhances combat effectiveness by extending the range, payload and endurance of receiver aircraft. It allows air power to be projected at greater distances or concentrated where and when it is needed mostly. “Air-to-air refueling capacity is the backbone of modern day air power. Without it, we don’t do much. Air power continuously needs fuel”, said Lieutenant-Colonel Harry Oostema, Head of Operations at Eindhoven air base. 

However, delivering a guaranteed, continuous coverage of air-to-air refueling capacity is challenging. “That’s why we need to train together. The European air-to-air refuelling Training (EART) at Eindhoven air base provides us with that unique opportunity”, Lieutenant-Colonel Oostema stressed. “For two weeks Eindhoven air base will be the tanker town of Europe”.

 

Background: EDA’s global approach on AAR

EDA has developed a global approach on AAR with three objectives: optimizing the use of assets, increasing the overall AAR capacity and reducing fragmentation of the fleet. This work has led to three complementary work-strands, on some of which EDA is cooperating closely with other agencies and organizations like OCCAR, the Movement Coordination Center Europe (MCCE) and the European Air Transport Command (EATC).

EART 2018 is part of the first work strand (optimization of existing capabilities), which is achieved by supporting training exercises. In this domain, EDA has also taken the lead to streamline the different certification processes leading to a clearance. By standardizing these processes the different aviation authorities can easily identify the differences between their own process and their counterpart. By working closely together, already fielded capabilities and future capabilities, can work more cost efficiently and increase their operational output.  

 

More information:

• Air-to-Air Refueling EDA project page
• Air-to-Air Refueling factsheet
• EATC website

 

Committees

Source : © European Union, 2018 - EP

Delegations

Source : © European Union, 2018 - EP