Ireland on the Eve of its Second Nice Treaty Vote

by Michael Dickgiesser, Hamburg and Rainer Rothe, Radolfzell

Because of their rejection of the Nice Treaty the Irish are being unjustly accused by those in favour of the EU of being against its Eastern Enlargement and acting against the interests of candidates waiting for admission to the Union.

However, firstly, the Nice Treaty entails numerous cases of transferring fundamental sovereign rights from the national to the EU level. It thus weakens each of the member states' sovereignty in favour of establishing an EU State.

Secondly, there is also a large amount of opposition within the candidate states themselves. In reality, Eastern Enlargement means that national economic, particularly rural-agricultural structures will be destroyed and sold off. Largely over the heads of their own citizens these structures are being illegally and gradually transferred to an EU super-state, a super-state that has not been legitimized by the peoples which belong to it. This has been done with the aid of dishonest propaganda praising the supposed benefits of Eastern Enlargement.

Further Step Towards an EU State

In general, the Nice Treaty is a further step towards the establishment of a non-legitimized EU State. Citizens of the European countries are not being asked whether they even want such a state. There is not even any legal basis for such a state. Alone for this reason, the attempt to establish an EU State should be rejected.

Only the Irish were able to vote on whether they agreed to sacrifi cing more of their sovereignty in favour of the Nice Treaty. They already voted against such a move on 7 June 2001. As a result, the Irish managed to prevent greater tragedy for all other EU citizens since the Nice Treaty can only come into effect once all member states of the EU/ EC have ratifi ed it. Following the example of Denmark, in which the 'vote-until-agreement method' was applied, the aim is to wear down Irish opposition instead of allowing people in each of the member states to decide for themselves whether they want to accept the Nice Treaty. Irish citizens rightly say: Once no means no.

In addition to this, the European Council's statement (issued in Annex IV of the Chairman's conclusions, Seville, 21 and 22 June 2002) refers only to Ireland's neutrality and its participation in building a European army; it alters nothing with respect to the EU's and the Nice Treaty's basic legitimization deficits.

On the one hand, the European Council is not an EU organ. It may develop political guidelines, but its decisions are not legally enforceable (by the European Court of Justice), and are therefore not binding. On the other hand, promises do not alter the fact that the Nice Treaty means a further loss of sovereignty in numerous aspects.

Ireland's Neutrality ...

Ireland's neutrality is being inappropriately and inadmissably, and in the fi nal instance over the heads of the Irish people, restricted to few core points, and thus de facto severely limited. It has often been pointed out in Current Concerns, in the case of Switzerland and Austria, that neutrality is defi ned by international law and that it therefore cannot legitimately be reduced to a few core points. Yet this is exactly what the Seville declaration does, bringing back unpleasant memories of Austria's vote on EU membership in 1994. There, too, the government promised its citizens that Austria's neutrality would remain intact despite EU membership. However, as in the case of the present issue of Austria's task in forming the EU's Common Foreign and Security Policy no one wanted to be reminded of the promises that had been made. The government even claimed that when voting on EU membership the people had also voted on reducing neutrality to a military core. This is an opinion that has repeatedly proved wrong from a legal perspective in articles published in Current Concerns and Zeit-Fragen. Yet Ireland's neutrality is, like Austria's, once again considerably threatened by the Nice Treaty.

... and the 'National Declaration by Ireland' signed in Seville ...

The promises regarding Irish neutrality can be found in a National Declaration by Ireland, consisting of seven points (Annex III), and in a Declaration of the European Council, consisting of six points (Annex IV).

First, the Irish government emphasizes the prime responsibility of the United Nations and the Security Council for world peace. This is a rather contradictory statement for a neutral state. Furthermore, the Irish government places particular emphasis on its continued participation in the EU's Common Foreign and Security Policy, claiming this is compatible with neutrality and does not touch on the special character of the security and defence policy of certain states. This, however, is incorrect. In clause 4 of its National Declaration the Irish government explicitly stresses 'that the development of the union's capacity to carry out humanitarian tasks and crisis management does not imply the setting up of a European army.' Consequently, humanitarian intervention and missions in the name of crisis management, semantically disguised as so-called tasks, are measures that, according to the Irish government, are compatible with neutrality. This, however, is certainly not the case.

It is true that the Irish government promised the Irish people that there would be another referendum if neutrality was affected by international treaties, but this only refers to changes that go beyond the above mentioned tasks. Thus, Irish neutrality (the National Declaration is enclosed with the ratification document, clause 7) is unduly reduced to a purely military core, that is, to the Irish rejection of both military participation and a liability for mutual assistance. In this connection, clause 6 of the National Declaration of Ireland is questionable too. It says that 'under Irish law the participation of contingents of the Irish defensive forces in missions abroad, including missions within the framework of the Foreign and Security Policy of the EU, requires a) the authorization of the Security Council or the UN General Assembly, b) the consent of the Irish government, and c) the approval of the Irish parliament, the Dáil Éirenn.' The need for an approval of the Irish people, however, is not mentioned although participation in such a mission is not compatible with the country's neutrality.

... as well as the Seville 'Declaration of the European Council'

The follow-up Declaration of the European Council takes cognizance of the Irish National Declaration and acknowledges that the Treaty on European Union does not impose any binding mutual defence commitments, and declares that this would be unchanged by the coming into force of the Nice Treaty. The treaty says, however, that the development of the Union's capacity to conduct humanitarian and crisis management tasks does not involve the establishment of a European army (clause 4), and, at the same time, in clause 6, that what will be left of Ireland's sovereignty, as well as of all the other member states after the adoption of the Nice Treaty, will be restricted to the question, 'on whether to commit military personnel to participate in any operation carried out under the European Security and Defence Policy'. These two declarations together imply that, in principle, all the tasks that are below this level--a military operation with Irish participation-- will in the future be compatible with Ireland's neutrality. Ireland would even be obliged to follow suit since the Irish government's neutrality reservations merely refer to the restrictions made in these two declarations: no obligation to delegate military personnel, no obligation to join the Treaty.

Thus, the two Seville Declarations restrict neutrality in an inadmissable way, and should therefore, according to the Irish constitution, have been put to the vote in Ireland. As was the case in Austria's 1994 vote on joining the EU, there is now a serious threat in Ireland that--without asking the Irish people--it is being claimed by referring to the declarations of Seville that Irish neutrality has already been restricted to a small military core. This danger is there anyway, if the Nice Treaty is adopted by the Irish people, since this declaration has been implemented in the Treaty posthumously. Thus, the Irish vote on the Nice Treaty has become again, and even more appallingly, a vote on the reduction and abandonment of neutrality. However, it is being sold under the guise of an Irish neutrality reservation. That these reservations had to be made is a victory of the Irish people and of law. However, its content is deceptive.

For a discussion of the importance of neutrality and the relevance of the regulations of the Nice Treaty we would like to refer the reader to Current Concerns No 5/6 of May- June 2001 and the article 'To be Independent of a Despotic System'.

Neutrality and Nice are incompatible

Through the Treaty of Nice, the opportunity to carry out common EU activities in the areas of foreign and security policy has been established in, among others, Article 24 of the Treaty on European Union. According to Article 25 a Political and Security Committee is to be newly established, which previously had only monitored matters of politics but is now given the power to assume the political control and strategic direction of crises management operations, meaning war (cf. Article 17, paragraph 2 of the Treaty on European Union). Although it is possible to demand a unanimous vote here (cf. Article 24, paragraph 3 in connection with Article 23, paragraph 2), the greatest and eternal danger posed by this provision is that such actions may be agreed upon, without submitting the issue to popular vote, thereby violating or abandoning neutrality.

In the context of the referendum on the Treaty of Nice there is a danger that this provision alone--without consideration for neutrality--may represent a blank cheque to every future Irish government to abandon neutrality. In itself it represents a contradiction to neutrality.

In addition, the revised version of Article 17 of the Treaty on European Union represents a further threat. The Treaty of Nice has taken the WEU out from Article 17 as originally formulated. As a result, the tasks outlined in Article 17, paragraph 2 of the Treaty on European Union - 'humanitarian and rescue tasks, peacekeeping tasks and tasks of combat forces in crisis management, including peacemaking'--are now the responsibility of the entire EU and not only of those states participating in the WEU (Germany, Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, Portugal, Spain, Great Britain and Holland). The Treaty of Nice has equally changed the so-called WEU's Petersberg tasks (Article 17, paragraph 2 of the Treaty on European Union) into those of the entire EU.

As a consequence, the EU has become an offensive alliance in which a neutral state cannot be a member at all. A neutral state must remain professedly neutral with respect to the international community. The Treaty of Nice will force even a neutral state to become part of a offensive alliance which it had particularly avoided by being excluded from the WEU. Denmark, Finland, Austria, Sweden, Greece and Ireland had all explicitly decided against joining the WEU.

The promises made in Seville do not diminish or allay the structural alterations brought about by the Nice Treaty, which are the transformation of the EU into an Offensive Alliance and Ireland's membership in this alliance. When countries are bombed in the name of the EU, the bombs will hit human beings. What has been promised in Seville does not change an ounce of the fact that they will be the bombs of the EU which Ireland is a part of. This no longer has anything to do with neutrality.