1.3.2022
EN
Official Journal of the European Union
C 99/119 Wednesday 7 July 2021
and missile defence; expresses strong concern about the expiry of the INF Treaty, which has created a new security risk for European countries in particular; calls for Europe’s security concerns to be recognised and properly addressed; regrets the recent withdrawals from the Treaty on Open Skies;
51.
Reaffirms its full support for the EU and its Member States’ commitment to the NPT as the cornerstone of the nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament regime; underlines the need to take effective measures in the direction of nuclear disarmament; reiterates its previous statement that international peace and security are strengthened in a world free from the existence and proliferation of nuclear weapons; urges the EU and NATO to strive towards an ambitious agenda for the preservation and strengthening of effective international arms control, disarmament and non-proliferation regimes as a cornerstone of global, transatlantic and European security, and recalls the need to pursue policies designed to move forward with the reduction of nuclear arsenals and to set limits on the deployment of hypersonic missiles; expresses concern about the current developments and initiatives in Iran as regards its uranium enrichment programme; reiterates its continued support for the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) as the best possible means of obtaining assurances of an exclusively peaceful use of nuclear energy by Iran; welcomes the resumption of talks, and calls on all parties to return to full compliance;
52.
Calls for the EU and its institutions, while building on the foundation laid by the ‘integrated approach’, to develop both a common security and defence culture, which respects the specific character of the security and defence policies of the Member States, as well as a strategic approach, throughout its policy-making, which should apply in particular to decisions in the fields of trade, supply chain management, investment screening, development cooperation, infrastructure, mobility and digital technologies; underlines the key role of the Strategic Compass in this regard; underlines that in areas such as hybrid and cyber threats, as well as countering disinformation campaigns, the EU institutions are well positioned to develop joint responses; welcomes, in this regard, the December 2020 Security Union Package and believes that this is a good first step which needs to be swiftly followed up by further actions; notes the proposal for an NIS 2 Directive;
53.
Stresses the significance of military mobility in ensuring the speedy movement of forces within and beyond the EU, which is important for an effective and preventive defence; calls for the EU and its Member States to step up efforts to continue to reduce procedural barriers to military mobility; welcomes the indispensable role of the EU when it comes to enhancing military mobility, and demands a significant increase in efforts made to implement this project, particularly through PESCO, but also by encouraging Member States to stimulate their industrial bases to propose competitive projects eligible for EU co-funding; calls for increased synergies on the EU side between the various actors involved; emphasises that a whole-of-government approach involving the EU institutions, Member States and NATO is necessary for military mobility to succeed; calls for consideration of an action plan focusing on EU-NATO common interests in military mobility by increasing ambition in areas such as digitalisation, the cyber resilience of transport infrastructure and systems, and the possibility of using artificial intelligence solutions for the benefit of military mobility; believes that this project demonstrates both the added value of EU-NATO cooperation and proof of how EU instruments and competences can contribute to NATO’s collective defence; welcomes the fact that significant amounts of EU funds have been allocated to collaborative defence projects, despite not matching initial ambitions; recalls that 38 of the 46 current PESCO projects respond to NATO defence planning priorities and welcomes potential third-country participation in such projects, in line with the provisions of the relevant Council decision;
Towards an ambitious partnership
54.
Fully subscribes to the statement in the recent NATO communiqué that the European Union remains a unique and essential partner for NATO; reiterates, in this light, its firm belief that EU-NATO relations need to be upgraded to a truly strategic level in order to reach the partnership’s full potential, building on the unprecedented progress already achieved and with the overall objective of building a genuine organisation-to-organisation relationship; calls for regular special summits with the participation of all NATO and EU heads of state and government in order to maintain trust and understanding at the highest levels, and expresses its long-term vision for an EU-NATO Partnership Council; encourages a discussion, furthermore, on the creation of a permanent Council of EU Defence Ministers, which should closely liaise with meetings of NATO defence ministers; underlines the principle of inclusiveness in this regard;