Informal meeting of EU Defence Ministers in Sofia discussed PESCO

Met dank overgenomen van Bulgaars voorzitterschap Europese Unie 1e helft 2018 (Bulgaars voorzitterschap) i, gepubliceerd op zaterdag 5 mei 2018.

An informal meeting of EU defence ministers took place in Sofia on 5 May 2018. The Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borissov took part in the first session of the meeting in a sign of acknowledgement and recognition of the efforts and achievements made in the field of joint acquisition of capabilities and defence cooperation.

“We discussed the role and tasks of the European Defence Agency and expressed support for the efforts made so far. We also talked about the governance of the Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO) and the military mobility”,

said the Bulgarian Defence Minister Krasimir Karakachanov, who hosted the meeting. Another main topic at the meeting was the way ahead for crisis management operations, which was discussed together with the United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations, Jean-Pierre Lacroix, and the Deputy Secretary General of NATO i, Rose Gottemoeller.

The High Representative of the EU for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini i, who chaired the meeting, announced that 17 projects under the Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO) were already running.

“By June, by the European Council, I will make sure that we will provide also publicly the state-of-play of the implementation of these projects. We have decided to adopt a new wave of projects later this year. This shows the level of commitment, but also satisfaction that Member States have on the PESCO process we have launched,”

she stated.

“We have focused today in particular on one of the projects that is also a flagship project in terms of EU - NATO cooperation and that is military mobility, where we have the purpose to allow for smooth and efficient movement of military forces across the European Union and beyond,”

High Representative Mogherini added.

Minister Karakachanov announced that Bulgaria, together with the European Defence Agency, will be hosting a Logistic Deploy Symposium focusing on military mobility in Brussels, Belgium, on 7 June.