We feel the January 30th, 2008 report published by ESI Institute ‘A Referendum on the unknown Turk? Anatomy of an Austrian debate’ is timely and topical. It attributes the cause of very low public support for Turkey accession within Austria to a lack of public debate. It makes the striking point that:

” ..until 2002, there was very little difference between Austrian views towards Turkey and any other EU
candidate…. that the enlargement debate until then had discussed “both pros and cons for each decision”. But that since 2004 Austria’s political parties (Austrian Social Democrats (SPO), Freedom Party, and, Austrian People’s Party (OVP)) had chosen to “..[defer] any serious debate in favour of an eventual referendum”.

The report concludes with a call for Austria to debate more the question of Turkey’s accession to the EU and Austria. And suggests that public sentiment may sharply improve with a more complete and balanced appraisal of the opportunities that Turkey as an EU state could bring.

Besides the appointment of ‘the High Representative’ the Lisbon Treaty provides for the creation of an External Action Service. To work in cooperation with the diplomatic service of Member States it would be comprised of: staff from General Secretariat of the European Council and Commission; and, staff seconded from Member State diplomatic services.

Article 13a states that the organization and functioning of this resource would be established by a decision of the Council. Such decision based on a proposal by the High Representative after consulting Parliament and with consent of Commission (see page 42).

It is unclear how such a service would best be deployed and how effective it could be. But among the many scenarios that seem plausible are: (a) expansion of resource in countries where present EU Member State diplomatic presence is light in number; (b) provision of resource within existing Member State mission tasked to serve needs of unrepresented Member States; and, (c) strengthened economic intelligence gathering to better inform European decision making.

And while some way off we thought it would be instructive to see how EU Member States are represented in Asia. After inputing the various mission details (Embassy, High Commission, and, Consulates) into a database we find there are 751 missions represented for the 27 EU Member States in 48 countries or territories (Hong Kong and Macao considered part of China) in Asia.

Most were in China (79) followed by India (44), and, Japan (31). Turkey had 52 missions and is an EU candidate country. Least representations were found in Timor (1) and the central Asia states of Kyrgystan (2) and Tajikistan (3). Charts and a table highlighting these trends can be found at the following link.

The past six weeks have seen comments/visits by EU Commissioner Ferrero-Waldner to the following:

• Armenia – Upcoming visit in February 2008/implementation of Action Plan/Inclusion in Baku-Tbilisi-Kar railway
• Georgia – Upcoming visit planned early February 2008/Free Trade Agreement negotiations (expected completion 2009)
• Tajikistan/Afghanistan – Stronger border controls
• Pakistan – +61 person observer mission for February 17th, 2008 election
• India – Promotion of democracy in Sri Lanka/Pakistan/Burma as well as energy security and climate change
• Lebanon – US$117 million grants and loans to reduce public debt
• Palestinian Authority – US$650 million funds
• Syria and Jordan – US$75 million funds toward Iraq refugees
• Singapore (EU-Asean Summit) – Myanmar/Free Trade Agreement
• China – Human rights

There has also been some discussion around implications of signing the Lisbon Treaty for the EU’s diplomatic presence around the world. And in particular the idea that all EU citizens can make use of any EU member state Embassy and Consulate facility should the need arise (loss of passport, arrest, death).

“…The European Commission unveiled plans yesterday for travellers to be able to use the consular services of any EU country and suggested members could merge their embassies….”

Mark Mardell’s blog also carried an interesting comment from former EU Commissioner of External Affairs Chris Patten around the likely role and challenges of the proposed High Representative for Foreign Affairs of Europe envisaged by the Lisbon Treaty. And that person’s ability to shape EU foreign policy.

“The Extremely High Rep, or whatever we are going to call him, has the ability to shape policy if he wants to do it because he chairs the Foreign Affairs Council…”

The past six weeks have seen the EU trade commissioner Peter Mandelson make notable announcements on China, Iraq, and, South Korea. Trade talks were also held with the Prime Minister of the Palestinian Authority.

At the 10th China-EU summit meeting in November besides highlighting the balance of EU-China trade reference was made to ways in which trade could be boosted through:

• appreciation of the Yuan currency;
• improvement in product safety of China’s exports (food, toys, consumer products);
• prevention of counterfeiting;
• improved access to China’s markets for European products and services; and,
• enforcement of intellectual property rights.

Besides that as from the start of 2008 the EU announced it had switched from import restrictions on several categories of Chinese textiles to a joint monitoring system with Beijing. The revised arrangements include a combination of export licenses to be issued by Chinese authorities to producers and a stronger surveillance regime to be imposed in Europe.

Dialogue continues on reaching agreement on a Free Trade Agreement with South Korea. And a third round of talks was held with Iraq on a trade and cooperation agreement covering energy, environment, trade, and security among other matters.

The Commissioner also published a speech on globalization following his visit to Asia which can be found here.

As ever more national legislation within Europe is aligned to laws created and set in Brussels lobbying in Europe assumes growing importance. But the question of where and who to lobby is critical.

An August 2006 seminar in networking in Europe provided some useful pointers in where to start Networking in the European Union. The source of the article is: Franziska Annerl (Press & Communications) of the EU-Office of the Austrian Federal Economic Chamber.

The seminar highlights that most effective lobbying for:

• European Commission is carried out at the legislative proposal phase;

• European Parliament at Parliamentary committees and at the Green paper stage of legislative drafting; and

• Council of Ministers is directed toward the COREPER members (or permanent representatives committee).

A list of members from the European Public Affairs Consultancies’ Association is found here.

The link below provides a web based database of EU member state missions in Asia. The goal being to understand where EU member states have embassies or consulates within Asia.

EU Member state embassies and consulates in Asia.

At this stage we have simply compiled the data and written the code to make the program work. In the New Year we would aim to begin a more comprehensive analysis of the information.

Several recent speeches by the President of France and foreign ministers of Germany and UK (who are among the most significant net budgetary contributors to the EU) provide a sense of where future EU priorities may lie. And while each spokesman has a different nuance the common issues are:

• tackling globalization in terms of trade (in face of fast growing significant Asia competition);
• european security and defense;
• securing energy supplies, energy efficiency, and emission standards; and,
• bolstering transatlantic ties.

Other priorities seem to fall within the necessity to manage migration to and within the EU, reduce world proverty, and, strengthen and secure the food supply.

A more open, trade orientated and assertive EU seems to be the preference for the UK and Germany with France seeking mainly to ensure that the EU achieves a fair level of reciprocity with its trading partners. Germany sees the EU as a model governing structure that links economic success with social equality. While the French President sees Europe’s strength in policy development as being optimized through a process of constructive debate.

More specifics can be found at the following links.

UK 15 November 2007 to College of Europe in Bruges

Germany 9 November 2007 at European Council of Foreign Relations Berlin opening

France 16 November 2007 French President address to European Parliament

Timothy Garton Ash February 2007 speech (Source: Prospect)

The table below shows the dates chapters for Turkey’s accession process were published and during which Presidency of the Council. While six remain in Council, 10 chapters were published during the German presidency, 8 during the Finnish, and, 4 during the Austrian presidency respectively.

Screening reports

Extracted from the 2007 Progress report by European Commission.

Turkey continues to move forward in the EU accession process. So far out of 33 chapters four have been opened and only one closed (Science and Research). The Commission states that 28 of 35 screening reports (80%) have been delivered to The Council and 6 are presently being discussed. Moreover the EU has informed Turkey of the progress required to reach a level of preparedness to start negotiations on 14 chapters.

Besides the EU websites a comprehensive picture of the state of play in the Accession process can be found at the European Union Secretariat General website of the Turkish government. Here the government publishes specifics around the screening process for each chapter of the acquis. At the time of writing screening meetings for all but three (chapters 17, 31, and, 33) of the Country sessions were online.

The following table is drawn from Commission comments in the 2007 progress report on Turkey’s EU accession process which was released 6 Nov 2007. In addition the Commission submitted a revised Accession Partnership document to Council that revises Turkey’s short and medium term priorities.

Source: European Commission

2007 Progress report

Note: BLOCKED chapters will open after resolution of Turkey and Cyprus access issues.