Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
04BRUSSELS4438
2004-10-15 10:20:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Brussels
Cable title:  

U.S.-EU DISCUSSIONS ON CRISES, FAILING STATES

Tags:  PGOV PREL EAID EUN USEU BRUSSELS 
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This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 BRUSSELS 004438 

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/15/2014
TAGS: PGOV PREL EAID EUN USEU BRUSSELS
SUBJECT: U.S.-EU DISCUSSIONS ON CRISES, FAILING STATES

REF: A. LONDON 7312


B. BRUSSELS 4107

C. BRUSSELS 3497

D. BRUSSELS 0014

Classified By: USEU POLOFF TODD HUIZINGA, FOR REASONS 1.4 (B) AND (D)

SUMMARY
-------

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 BRUSSELS 004438

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/15/2014
TAGS: PGOV PREL EAID EUN USEU BRUSSELS
SUBJECT: U.S.-EU DISCUSSIONS ON CRISES, FAILING STATES

REF: A. LONDON 7312


B. BRUSSELS 4107

C. BRUSSELS 3497

D. BRUSSELS 0014

Classified By: USEU POLOFF TODD HUIZINGA, FOR REASONS 1.4 (B) AND (D)

SUMMARY
--------------


1. (C) On October 5 Ambassador Carlos Pascual, Coordinator
for Reconstruction and Stabilization (S/CRS),met with EU
officials and laid the ground work for closer cooperation
with the EU in dealing with crises and failing states.
Agreeing that U.S. and EU priorities fit well in this area,
EU contacts expressed a desire to work together but cautioned
that the EU faced institutional and resource constraints.
Commission interlocutors pointed to a recently proposed
streamlining of EC foreign assistance, which, if approved for
2007, would include a "stability instrument" of 500-600
million Euros to tackle crises in third countries. EU
Council officials summarized EU crisis-management operations
and aspirations, and said a civilian/military planning cell
-- which might be a good partner for S/CRS -- would be set up
by end of year. EU Council Director for Policy and Planning
Christoph Heusgen suggested that S/CRS work together with his
office to develop a U.S.-EU dialogue on &early warning8
assessments of countries at risk. END SUMMARY.

U.S., EU ON SIMILAR TRACKS BUT EU HAMPERED
--------------


2. (C) EU Council Secretariat Director-General Robert Cooper
(see ref C) said U.S. plans were "highly relevant to what the
EU wants to do but now does rather badly;" if the
constitutional treaty is ratified, he said, an EU Foreign
Minister and EU Diplomatic Service could help bring together
"significant political, military and foreign-aid clout" )-
coordination that the EU currently lacks. Cooper said that,
at present, the Council Secretariat was working on crisis
management, with a military staff of about 150 and a police
unit of about a dozen police officers, but without an
institutional framework that encompassed both the political
authority of the member states and the Commission's funds.
Until these elements existed under a single framework, the EU
would continue to "learn crisis management by doing," but

would not be able to develop an S/CRS equivalent.


3. (C) Other interlocutors commented on the EU institutional
framework as well. Marc van Bellinghen, Deputy Director of
the European Commission Office of Conflict Prevention and
Crisis Management (Directorate-General for External
Relations),specified the constraints the EU Council
Secretariat was subject to when trying to act in a crisis

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situation: Council action requires unanimous agreement of
the 25 member states, thus delaying the EU response to crisis
situations; also, the Council Secretariat has virtually no
budget (CFSP budget is 50 million Euro/year) and very little
manpower for taking action outside of Brussels. Council
interlocutors, on the other hand, outlined for us the
constraints under which the Commission must work: while the
Commission has money for crisis management, it does not have
the political backing; whereas Council crisis-management
operations are usually carried out by people seconded from
the member states under the political control of the
member-state officials on the EU Political and Security
Committee (PSC),the Commission often outsources its
on-the-ground work to experts without an official connection
to -- and without the political backing of -- member-state
governments.

COMMISSION MAY INAUGURATE "STABILITY INSTRUMENT"
-------------- ---


4. (C) Van Bellinghen acknowledged the Commission's need to
"adapt its foreign-aid instruments" so that the EC could
"respond to crises in real time." He said that that was a
principal purpose of the proposed streamlining of the EC
foreign-aid system that the Commission had proposed in a
White Paper published on September 29 ("On the Instruments
for External Assistance under the Future Financial
Perspective 2007-2013"). The proposal includes a "stability
instrument" of about 500-600 million euros per year to tackle
crises and instability in third countries. Commission Deputy
Director-General for External Relations Michael Leigh
affirmed that such a stability mechanism would give the EC
more resources and greater flexibility in dealing with crises
quickly. For the present, until Council and Commission
authorities would be brought together under the new
constitution in 2007, Leigh noted that RELEX focuses more on
medium-term issues, while crises are more likely to be
managed by the Council. He said he expected the Commission
proposal to get the necessary approval of the European
Parliament and member states, and to be up and running by

2007. Leigh added, though, that the amount of money that
would actually be made available for a stability mechanism
could not yet be predicted. (NOTE: Van Bellinghen named the
500-600m euro figure, but that does not appear in the
Commission White Paper. END NOTE.)
CRISIS MANAGEMENT MOVING UP EU AGENDA
--------------

5. (C) Michael Matthiessen, EU Council Secretariat Director
of Civilian Crisis Management, said S/CRS activities and
plans were strikingly similar to that of his Directorate. He
said EU priorities for crisis management were expanding
capabilities for missions in four priority areas: police,
rule-of-law assistance, civil administration and civil
protection. He noted that the EU had succeeded in meeting
its headline goal targets for building rapid reaction
capacities in the four priority areas. Given expanded EU
membership, the Council was revising targets upward regarding
the available on-call pool for the four civilian headline
goal elements and two new areas: monitoring capacity and
staff for EUSRs.


6. (C) Matthiesen stressed that the Council was responsible
for not only strategic level planning, but also for the
operational conduct of EU crisis-response missions. He
described the EU's three current civilian crisis-management
missions: the EU Police Mission (EUPM) in Bosnia, the
PROXIMA police mission in FYROM, and the ESDP rule-of-law
mission in Georgia. Matthiessen added that EU was
considering or planning several future missions: (1) a
police mission in Kinshasa to train DRC police; (2) the
sending of police planners to Addis Ababa to help the African
Union in Darfur; (3) an as-yet undefined civilian crisis
management mission in Iraq (Matthiessen will go on a
fact-finding trip to Iraq in October to assess needs for
civilian crisis management in time for the November 5 visit
of Iraqi Prime Minister Allawi to Brussels); (4) a possible
police-assistance mission to the Palestinian Territories; and
(5) a possible replacement of UNMIK police with EU police in
KOSOVO. (NOTE: deliberations on 3-5 above are in the
beginning stages. END NOTE.)


7. (C) Most interlocutors pointed out that crisis management
and dealing with failed and failing states is central to the
European Security Strategy (ESS),which is the strategic
foundation of the European Security and Defense Policy
(ESDP). An important component of the ESS is "effective
multilateralism with the UN at its core" (refs B, D).
Against that background, our EU contacts said the EU would
enthusiastically welcome an S/CRS approach, as described by
Pascual, that included close cooperation with the UN. EU
Council Secretariat Policy Unit Director Christoph Heusgen
proposed that a first step on enhancing U.S.-EU coordination
on crisis issues could be to begin a regular dialogue on
&early warning8 assessments, given that the U.S. and the EU
had undertaken similar, regular exercises to identify
countries at-risk. He also referred us to the EU-UN Joint
Declaration on Crisis Management. Jim Cloos, Council
Secretariat Director for UN Affairs, Human Rights and

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Transatlantic Relations, is in charge of implementation of
the agreement. In response to Ambassador Pascual,s appeal
for EU support to encourage concrete efforts by the UN to
improve coordination among UN agencies involved in
post-conflict operations, Heusgen said Cloos should be
brought into the loop in developing thoughts on how EU-UNcooperation might be
relevant to the S/CRS approach.

CIV/MIL PLANNING CELL: USEFUL S/CRS PARTNER
--------------


8. (C) Both Cooper and Matthiessen suggested that the
Council's incipient Civilian/Military Planning Cell (CMPC)
could be a natural partner for S/CRS. According to our
interlocutors, the CMPC should be set up by the end of this
year, with about 60 staff preparing action plans for crisis
management -- including both military and civilian components
as needed -- based on an EU watch list of potential crisis
countries. Cooper said he foresaw the CMPC as first
developing the capability to manage a crisis monitoring
operation; later, he hoped, it could manage Disarmament,
Demobilization and Reintegration (DDR) programs; finally,
even further in the future, Cooper envisaged the CMPC
managing post-conflict reconstruction programs. Ambassador
Pascual noted that the EU was aware of the U.S. position on
EU planning capability. He welcomed, however, the cell,s
stated role to act as a coordinator of EU civilian
stabilization and reconstruction activities.

COMMENT: SEEDS PLANTED, CONTINUE CONSULTS
--------------


9. (C) Since the December 2003 approval of the ESS and the
related advent of the concept of effective multilateralism,
crisis management and dealing with failing states have been
moving toward the center of EU foreign and security policy
thinking. Thus, this visit to introduce S/CRS struck a
chord. EU capabilities and resources in these areas are not
commensurate with the EU's economic clout or the political
weight of the member states, but the EU is working hard to
make progress -- the proposed Commission "stability
instrument" and the planned Council civ/mil planning cell are
two examples of this. Continued consultation with the EU on
these issues could help us not only to reach our objectives
for S/CRS, but also encourage a pragmatic and positive
approach to "effective multilateralism," as opposed to the
ideological multilateralism of many in the EU with its
intense suspicion of American "hegemony." END COMMENT.


10. (U) This message has been cleared by Ambassador Pascual.

MCKINLEY