Strasbourg, January 19, 2006

Motion of a resolution by Tobias Pflüger (MEP): Why I continue to reject the EU Constitutional Treaty

1) A civil and social Europe on the basis of the EU Constitutional Treaty is impossible.

2) The EU Constitution is supposed to decidedly advance EU militarisation. In comparison to the valid EU Treaty of Nice, a whole range of militarization projects, such as the EU arms agency (III-311) and the Battle Groups (III-312) are firmly enshrined by the constitutional treaty. EU-NATO cooperation receives constitutional rank (I-41,7).

3) The EU Constitutional Treaty is supposed to make the EU fit for conducting global war. It opens a legal space for world-wide military interventions (I-41,1 and III-309)

4) The EU Constitutional Treaty contains an explicit obligation to arm (I-41,3). In case of ratification, the tendency at the EU level to spend ever more money for armament and military intervention would even reinforce itself. In contrast to the Nice Treaty, the EU Constitutional Treaty would even permit the institution of an independent EU military budget.

5) By way of the EU Constitutional Treaty, the Foreign and Security policy of the EU is not sworn in on the UN Charta as a whole but simply on the principles of the UN Charta (I- 3,4). This leaves room for interpretation to the EU in order to lead war even without an UN mandate.

6) The EU Constitutional Treaty serves as a programmatic blueprint in order to push ahead with EU militarization. Thus the EU responsible officials are trying to implement part of the EU Constitutional Treaty bypassing the valid treaty situation. For instance, the Austrian Council presidency has declared as its goal to extend the EU arms agency (III-311) and to fully install the Battle Groups (III-312) until 2007.

7) Almost treason is the language of the Duff/Voggenhuber report voted on January 19, 2006 in the EU parliament. Thus the report defends the opinion of the EU constitutional treaty “that a positive result of the reflection phase would consist in holding on to the present text, although this would only be possible, if important measures for calming public opinion were linked to that”. Apparently the intention is to simply gloss over the results of the referenda in France and in the Netherlands. That won’t work.

8) By way of the EU Constitutional Treaty, neoliberalism is supposed to acquire constitutional rank (III- 177). The current anti-social law initiatives of the EU commission for the port and Bolkestein directives are only a first taste of that. The proposal by the German chancelloress Angela Merkel to append to the constitution a legally non-binding declaration on the “social dimension” of Europe to then get another vote in France and in the Netherlands is simply scandalous in this context.

9) The EU Constitutional Treaty must finally be put ad acta in order to open a perspective to a social and civilian Europe.

Strasbourg, January 19th 2006
Tobias Pflüger, European deputy of the Left fraction
Source: http://ww.pds-europa.de/dokumente/reden/view_dok_html?zid=2062
Translated by Carla Krüger, January 19, 2006