EU presses its case in search for peace role

Date: 24/10/1996

By Elizabeth Wise

PATIENCE is running out in EU capitals as the Union continues to remain an observer of the power-brokering now taking place in the Middle East peace process.

Neither the United States nor the warring parties themselves have made any effort to encourage Union involvement in the quest for an end to the current hostilities.

But despite the absence of such an overture, EU foreign ministers will consider appointing a special envoy for the region when they meet in Luxembourg on Monday (28 October).

The idea - designed to support peace efforts and to increase the Union's political visibility in the area - was first raised by EU leaders at their informal summit in Dublin earlier this month.

Former Spanish Premier Felipe González was one name mentioned for the new post. But without waiting for any appointment to be made, several EU leaders have already decided to enter the murky waters of the peace process.

French President Jacques Chirac and Italian Premier Romano Prodi toured the region during the past week and pressed hard for an EU role in the talks. “Naturally we are not trying to force our way in. I am simply saying that ... we have valid reasons to be involved and that a certain balance of things may justify the presence of Europe and of France,” said Chirac.

In Cairo, Prodi warned that there would be no peace in the Mediterranean basin without Europe, while Chirac even maintained that EU participation would improve the talks which “in recent months have revealed their limitations”.

His words rang too true for comfort, coming on the very day the US Middle East envoy was heading back to Washington for consultations after failing

to broker an Israeli-Palestinian agreement on the terms of Israel's withdrawal from the West Bank city of Hebron.

Irish Foreign Minister Dick Spring, who will chair Monday's EU meeting, has insisted he will not turn the occasion into a confrontation with Washington. “There is no question of interfering, or of imposing ourselves,” he said last weekend.

His words reflected a natural caution given Israeli Premier Benjamin Netanyahu's clear reluctance to see prominent Union involvement.

“I would be very careful before I would add more cooks to the broth,” he said even before Chirac arrived on Monday. His Foreign Minister David Levy was even more categorical, insisting: “A mediator entering into the conflict or into the negotiations is inconceivable.”