Paris, 3 December 2009 – The Assembly agreed on Wednesday that European Union countries should highlight the benefits of stronger joint security and defence to convince public opinion of the advantages of further EU enlargement.

Presenting a report entitled “European security and enlargement: shifts in public opinion” (Document 2054) for the Committee for Parliamentary and Public Relations, Mr John Greenway (United Kingdom, Federated Group) said that “public support for EU enlargement would be greatly strengthened if much more effort was made by both the EU and national governments to explain and promote the benefits of collective security and the strategic, geopolitical advantages of a wider EU membership”.

“While measuring public appetite for accession involves several factors – economic, social, historic, cultural and geopolitical – the enhanced security value of a more positive approach to the accession process, let alone to EU membership, is of critical value and importance”. This would build on the fact that the public is “not unsympathetic to arguably the most tangible benefit of the EU and the much enhanced political cooperation of the past half century is the peace dividend”, he added.

The report tried “to adopt a neutral tone,” he said. “It is not my intention to take sides, but to foster and encourage progress”. It gave the current status of nine neighbour and applicant countries – Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Iceland, Kosovo, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Turkey.

Mr Greenway said he believed that Turkey should be invited to join the EU, partly because it formed a bridge between energy suppliers and consumers in Europe and would “help to secure the resolution of the many problems in the Middle East, where it is respected”.

In a report entitled “EU and WEU Council information on European security and defence policy” (Document 2059), Mr Giacomo Santini (Italy, Federated Group), who was an MEP from 1994 to 2004, said that the EU Council should “transmit all Council reports on European foreign, security and defence policy simultaneously to the European Parliament, the national parliaments of the EU member states and the Assembly”. He told the Assembly that the European Parliament must communicate with national parliaments and that a satisfactory solution should be found for interparliamentary dialogue on CFSP. Both reports were adopted unanimously.
During a joint debate on the two reports, Mrs Claire Curtis-Thomas (United Kingdom, Socialist Group) said that ministers should be asked to comment on reports they received “to make sure they have read them”. Mrs Birgen Keles (Turkey, Socialist Group) said it was difficult to explain to the public why the EU had pushed Turkey aside from the new EU defence structures, when it had been a member of NATO for more than half a century.
Mr José Mendes Bota (Portugal, Federated Group) remarked that public opinion was more concerned about fighting unemployment, terrorism and crime than EU enlargement, while Mrs Vesna Marjanovic (Serbia) said that a large majority of Serbs were in favour of EU membership. The fact that Serbs can enter Schengen countries without visas “has had a very positive effect on public opinion”, she added.
Both Mrs Elsa Papadimitriou (Greece, Federated Group) and Mr Ionas Nicolaou (Cyprus, Federated Group) said they were in favour of Turkey’s admission to the EU. Mr Nicolaou expressed his personal support, as well as that of the Republic of Cyprus, for the accession of Turkey to the European Union. He underlined, however, that this support was not unconditional and that Turkey needed to fulfill its obligations towards the European Union, including the Republic of Cyprus, as well as meeting the same criteria that applied to all candidate countries, if it was to continue its accession course.