Paris, 26 March 2007 - Portugal will hold the EU/WEU presidency for six months from 1 July 2007. With this in view, the Assembly´s Enlarged Presidential Committee met in Lisbon on 21 March to discuss Portugal´s priorities for the presidency with the President of the Portuguese Parliament, Mr Jaime GAMA, the Chairman of the Portuguese Assembly´s Foreign Affairs Committee, Mr José Luis ARNAUT, the Chairman of the National Defence Committee, Mr Júlio Miranda CALHA and parliamentary group leaders (Mr Fernando NEGRÃO (PSD), Mr Bernardino SOARES (PCP), Mr Nuno MAGALHÃES (CDS-PP), Mr Luis FAZENDA (BE)). The President of the WEU Assembly, Jean-Pierre MASSERET (France, Socialist Group), thanked the Chairman of the Assembly´s Portuguese Delegation, Mr José Eduardo Vera JARDIM (Socialist Group) for his active support and welcomed the constructive proposals of the Vice-Chairman of the Delegation, Mr João Mota AMARAL (Federated Group), to better ensure “interparliamentary” scrutiny of EU “intergovernmental” policies, in particular the European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP). All the speakers stressed the need for enhanced ESDP scrutiny.

Mr Jaime GAMA acknowledged that the EU was going through a crisis and that it was therefore advisable to work within existing frameworks using the tools currently available. Mr Mendes BOTA (Portugal, Federated Group) recalled that as long as the EU member states had not agreed on a mutual defence clause within the EU framework, the modified Brussels Treaty which was still in force retained its full political relevance.

With a view to preparing the incoming Portuguese presidency of the EU/WEU, the WEU Assembly members also met Mr António BRAGA, State Secretary for Foreign Affairs (and former member of the Assembly), and Mr João Mira GOMES, State Secretary for National Defence and Maritime Affairs. The Portuguese EU/WEU presidency takes over from the German presidency (EU/WEU) and is followed by Slovenian (EU) and French (WEU) presidencies.

For the first time, a common 18-month programme for the three successive EU presidencies (German, Portuguese and Slovenian) was published in December 2006. This includes an ambitious “External relations” chapter. Key priorities shared by the three presidencies in the field of ESDP are as follows: development of the EU´s military (Headline Goal 2010) and civilian capabilities (Headline Goal 2008), preparing the EU´s upcoming “police and rule-of-law” mission in Kosovo, revising the Joint Actions concerning the European Defence Agency and the European Security and Defence College in the second half of 2007, strengthening the EU´s strategic partnerships with NATO, the OSCE and the UN, setting up a broader dialogue on security in the Mediterranean region and a summit with Africa.

The incoming Portuguese presidency intends to make progress on all these priority issues, proceeding by “small steps”, prompting  President MASSERET to ask whether we should “go forward at 27 moving together slowly on security and defence issues or advance in smaller numbers but taking larger strides?”

At the invitation of the President of the Portuguese Parliament, a seminar on “Europe´s maritime borders” is to be organised by the WEU Assembly in Lisbon on Tuesday 18 September 2007. This will identify the real threats and “coastguard” missions, examine actions already undertaken by the EU in this area and discuss the new roles of European navies.