Translation
ADDRESS BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF FINLAND
MR. MARTTI AHTISAARI TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT
IN STRASBOURG ON 17.6.1998
It is a great honour for me to address the European
Parliament. In the decades that the work of building up the Union
has been in progress, the Parliament has often indicated the way
forward, presenting views that have provided a foundation and
support for decisions, including difficult ones.
The Parliament has encouraged member states to develop the Union
into not only an economic community, but also a political one. It
has advocated a Union that is more democratic and open and
displays greater solidarity. I remember with special warmth the
Parliaments broad support, just over four years ago, for
the last enlargement and thereby also for Finnish accession.
Finland will assume the Presidency of the European Council in a
year from now. Our term at the helm will be challenging. Several
categories of issues that are important for the European Union
will fall due for resolution in the course of next year.
Because of those decisions, as well as for other reasons, we
consider it important that during our Presidency we shall be able
to cooperate as closely as possible with the Parliament.
The history of our continent has contained stages in which the
peoples of Europe have not determined their own destinies. In
past centuries, attempts have been made to unite Europe through
wars, coercion and by arranging dynastic marriages. The results
have usually been devastating.
The political and economic integration set in train by the Treaty
of Paris has fulfilled the hopes focused on it. The results of
integration have bound the peoples and states of Europe to each
other in a way that gives them the opportunity to build their own
future together.
This time, the building of Europe has been founded on
voluntariness, political will. Its success has always depended on
the ability of political decision-makers to see beyond short-term
national interests. Over the decades, we have repeatedly seen
that determination and courage are demanded of political leaders
most acutely when narrow parish-pump tendencies are at their
strongest.
The Union has been built by the generations for whom European
unification has been a question of war and peace. We must take
care not to waste the inheritance they have given us. Their
fresh-mindedness has served as the foundation for building a more
stable and secure community in Europe. Peace can never be taken
for granted.
We must remember that the generation that was born after the war
and has lived its whole life in conditions of peace needs also
other arguments in favour of the Unions existence.
Maintaining security and stability are still the primary goals of
integration. In the present situation, however, the concept of
security must be understood more broadly than in the past. More
than traditional military security is involved. To an increasing
degree, threats are associated with environmental hazards,
uncontrolled migratory flows and international crime. These are
problems that can not be combated with weapons; instead, the
entire range of means that integration offers must be used.
Globalisation, strengthening the social dimension, developing the
information society, to mention but a few examples of new
phenomena, are creating new demands for the future of
integration. A central task for the EU is to defend the European
model of society, which is founded on social responsibility and
solidarity.
When my predecessor paid a visit here five years ago, Finland was
negotiating her membership of the European Union. The fall of the
Berlin Wall had triggered a process of change that is still in
progress. With it, the military and political division of Europe
has receded. The last enlargement of the EU was connected with
this change.
Change in our continent has been turbulent throughout the
nineties. Over the next few years, the Unions ability to
manage this change will be evaluated especially against the
yardstick of how successfully it carries through the next round
of enlargement.
The accession of the Central and Eastern European countries to
membership of the Union will be a multi-stage and demanding
process. Preparation for membership will require major efforts on
the part of the candidate countries. The Union will likewise have
to develop its policies in various sub-fields and restructure its
decision-making system to enable it to receive additional
members.
The European Union and its working methods must be reformed. We
cannot afford a Union that citizens regard as ineffectual,
wasteful, remote and secretive. We must search our souls and ask
whether what we are doing lives up to the expectations that are
focused on us.
The European Union stands on a strong foundation, because our
community is based on shared values. We believe it is possible to
create a Union that is both efficient and democratic, competitive
and social, politically united and recognises the diversity of
values that its members represent.
What is essential is that we recognise the complexity of future
challenges and face them together, on the Union level and in a
way that takes the points of view of the different parties into
consideration.
A debate concerning the course that the future development of the
Union should follow is ongoing. One of the factors that have
prompted it are the impending turn of the millennium. Now it is
natural both to look back at what has been accomplished and also
forward, assessing what we want to achieve from now on in.
Finland wants a strong Union, because it is a strong Union that
will be best placed to promote its members interests and
goals. Our prosperity is founded on stability in Europe and its
adjacent regions as well as on extensive and
effectively-functioning markets. Using the means that cooperation
and integration make available, we shall strengthen not only
stability in our continent, but also our own position. From our
own perspective, the European Union is also a security community.
That is why we care about the EUs ability to function
effectively. Throughout the period of her membership, Finland has
wished to work in a way that supports and enhances the efficiency
of the Unions decision-making processes.
The Treaty of Amsterdam will enshrine several positive new
elements of importance to us in the documents on which the Union
is founded. Among the benefits that it will bring are greater
openness and an improved ability on the part of the Union to take
care of employment and environmental questions. In some respects,
however, the work remained uncompleted in Amsterdam;
unfortunately, the Treaty does not in all respects correspond to
the requirements that the Union is expected to meet with regard
to its capacity for action. There is a need for an institutional
reform that will meet three requirements.
First of all, the concentration in reform must be on matters that
are essential from the perspective of the Unions
effectiveness. The best way to safeguard effectiveness is to
increase the use of qualified-majority decision-making in matters
that it is most purposeful to deal with on the European level. We
have often noticed that the unanimity-based procedure can prevent
necessary decisions being reached. Even more often, it has made
the Union a ponderous actor and thereby damaged its credibility
both as a unifying force for its member states and as a player on
the international scene. No division between pillars must be
allowed to prevent more effective decision-making.
Secondly, arrangements with a bearing on making the system of
decision-making more effective must be sustainable. Institutional
reforms should correspond to the Unions needs irrespective
of how many new members are admitted in the future and in how
many waves.
Thirdly, the reforms must be decided on in good time before the
next enlargement. For her part, Finland is prepared to carry the
reform process forward as soon as the preconditions for beginning
have been met. The historic EMU decisions have been made and
monetary union will take effect at the beginning of next year.
Now ratification of the Treaty of Amsterdam and deliberation of
the Agenda 2000 proposals must be concluded. As things now stand,
it seems that the time could be ripe to launch an institutional
reform process towards the end of next year.
A Union that is both enlarging and deepening its integration is
becoming the focus of growing expectations also on the
international level. The EU has influence and bears
responsibility beyond its own borders.
Especially in traditional trade talks, the Unions
negotiating power has been substantial. Yet its capability as an
international actor has not in all respects been commensurate
with its economic might.
For the Union to be able to protect its interests and make a
constructive contribution to solving common problems, it must add
efficiency to its actions in the area of external relations. This
applies also to its external economic relations, in which the
creation of a common currency area will further accentuate the
need for a comprehensive changeover to communal procedures.
Another area in which more is being expected of the EU is the
resolution of international crises. The aim of strengthening the
EUs capacity for action in the field of military crisis
management was enshrined in the Treaty of Amsterdam. This
corresponds to existing security needs in Europe and, from the
perspective of the EUs present development, is a realistic
step in the evolution of a common defence policy. When the Treaty
has entered into force, the Union would have to have the
political will to intervene in crises, also militarily if
necessary. In the area of crisis management, the EU would be
capable of a more comprehensive range of actions than any anyone
else, because it also has economic and political instruments at
its disposal.
Only a Union that is effective and treats its external relations
as a totality can function in a way that accords with the new,
broadly-based concept of security.
Some of the new challenges of this kind that face the EU emanate
from northern regions. For example, Finlands eastern
frontier, which is also the border between the EU and Russia, is
one of the worlds deepest standard-of-living gulfs. Behind
it and elsewhere in northern regions smoulder numerous problems
that it lies equally strongly in the interests of all of us to
solve. On the other hand, these regions have great potential on
the European scale of things, and it can be effectively availed
of only through cooperation between states.
For this the Union must create a northern dimension, with the aid
of which it can coordinate and dovetail its actions in the North.
In recent years the EU has successfully strengthened its southern
dimension through the Barcelona process. By means of both the
northern and the southern dimension stability and security will
be effectively created in regions adjacent to the EU and the
Unions role as an international actor will be strengthened.
European integration was born of war, built on ruins and grew in
a spirit of affinity. Its power is the right to choose in freedom
and its strength is in shared values. In the political sense, the
cementing force of integration lies in the European Union and its
institutions, which guarantee continuity.
The transformation of Europe will continue. Political
decision-making will have to adjust to the demands of this
change. But adjustment alone will not be enough. The inheritance
that we have received from past generations and our
childrens future obligate us to do a lot more.
Half a century ago, the founders of the European Communities
presented a vision of a new Europe. That vision has been largely
fulfilled. Now Europe needs a vision for the new century and
decision-makers who dare to trust the power of integration.