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EU nations, including France, laud chief diplomat Ashton

10 March 2012, 19:18 CET
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(COPENHAGEN) - EU foreign ministers praised Catherine Ashton's leadership of the bloc's fledgling diplomatic service Saturday, a day after controversy hit talks on how to give it a louder voice on the world scene.

"We are very satisfied with the work the external service is doing," said Denmark's Villy Sovndal, who chaired the informal two-day talks. "It's a very young child, we think it's improving."

"Europe is more and more talking with one voice," he said of the year-old service. "Congratulations to Cathy."

Ashton, who has battled critics during efforts to build the new European External Action Service, or EEAS, said ministers had agreed during the talks on how to move forward, promoting European values worldwide while protecting the bloc's interests.

"There's lots to be done but there's a sense of unity within the European Union," she said.

A strong word of praise for Ashton's daunting challenge to streamline policies from 27 disparate nations came from France, whose minister was quoted as criticising her on the eve of the talks.

A leaked letter to Ashton from Foreign Minister Alain Juppe urging improvements at the EEAS had thrown a pall over the talks.

"I wrote a paper in which I made a certain number of suggestions. Some saw criticism in them, which was not at all the spirit in which I wrote the paper," Juppe said at the close of the talks.

Juppe had called in his letter for "more coherence and efficiency in the EU's external action", saying "principles agreed on have not yet really been applied."

On Saturday he told reporters that "I consider that Mrs Ashton has undertaken her difficult task with great efficiency."

He also praised her "very important role" in leading talks on behalf of world powers on Iran's contested nuclear drive.

The EEAS, he added, was "still a small child" that needed to grow and "we hope it will improve its coordination with national diplomatic services as well as on the ground."

Ashton, a former British Labour politician appointed to the UK's upper house of parliament, has been dogged by eurosceptic British conservatives and often slammed for a lack of visibility. She had brushed aside any thought that Juppe had been critical, saying he was merely offering a positive contribution to the debate.

Her service, which has a 9.5-billion euro annual budget, currently has a staff of some 1,500 in Brussels and 2,000 in 140 foreign delegations.

EU foreign ministers agreed during the talks to strengthen its role in defending human rights and the freedom of religion and belief worldwide, by naming a special rights envoy and setting an action plan later this year.

Juppe said that to promote core European values such as democracy, rights and peace, the EU, the world's leading donor, must do more than act as a cash register distributing "lots of money".

The talks however were also clouded by a report in the Financial Times Saturday suggesting London had been manoeuvring to replace Ashton with a former French foreign minister in a game of musical chairs aimed at safeguarding the British financial sector.

But it quoted a denial from a spokesman for European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso as saying he "never had and never does have the intention to propose this change".

The paper had said London wanted Ashton, originally appointed to the EU executive by Gordon Brown's Labour government, with Internal Markets Commissioner Michel Barnier.

"It is a single story in a paper. Cathy Ashton has her mandate for the whole period. End of discussion," said Finland's Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja.

Asked whether he thought Ashton was doing a good job, powerful Germany's Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle gave a clear "Yes!"


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