DEFENCE: FIRST EU MINISTERIAL MEETING TAKES STOCK OF LIMITED PROGRESS.

There have been advances in the establishment of the Capability Development Mechanism, Ministers noted, but further efforts were needed, they agreed, to fill the gaps, and to fix the principles and the framework that could ensure coherency with NATO. Member States have also been co-operating on the European Capabilities Action Plan, and working groups have begun intensive studies of the most persistent and conspicuous deficiencies in order to identify solutions - in areas as diverse as the long-distance large-volume air transport required to put EU forces in theatre - and sophisticated weapon systems. A full report on progress is to be presented during the upcoming Danish Presidency (although that discussion will be chaired by Greece, the following Presidency, since Denmark has opted out of CESDP).The state of the promised rapid response force that the December 1999 Helsinki Summit committed the EU to have in place by 2003 was also examined - but here the underlying problems of EU defence policy remain a still insuperable barrier. The necessary links to NATO - for systematic assets, particularly in planning - remain to be formalised, because Greece still refuses to sign off on the EU-NATO deal that was intended to assuage opposition within NATO itself, from Turkey. Turkey's price for dropping its opposition was guarantees of EU consultation whenever action was envisaged in...