EU — Meeting of the European Union Military Committee

Meet­ing of the Euro­pean Union Mil­i­tary Com­mit­tee at Chiefs of Defence level

Brus­sels, 4 May 2010
The Chiefs of Defence (CHODs) of the 27 Euro­pean Mem­ber States met today in Brus­sels, under the chair­man­ship of Gen­er­al Håkan Syrén, to dis­cuss the state of play regard­ing the mil­i­tary oper­a­tions cur­rent­ly con­duct­ed by the Euro­pean Union and the main activ­i­ties car­ried out in the Union to improve Euro­pean mil­i­tary capa­bil­i­ties.

Dur­ing the infor­ma­tion ses­sion, CHODs agreed an EUMC (EU Mil­i­tary Com­mit­tee) Strate­gic Plan record­ing the strate­gic pri­or­i­ties and relat­ed key actions to be used to guide the fur­ther work of the Mil­i­tary Committee.

The oper­a­tions ses­sion was opened by Gen. John McColl, the Com­man­der of Oper­a­tion EUFOR Althea, who pro­vid­ed the forum with his assess­ment of the cur­rent sit­u­a­tion in Bosnia Herze­gov­ina and referred to the pos­si­ble future force pos­ture options and asso­ci­at­ed challenges.

Com­ing to EUNAVFOR Ata­lan­ta, Rear Admi­ral Peter Hud­son, Oper­a­tion Com­man­der, pre­sent­ed an analy­sis of the EU’s com­mit­ment in the Gulf of Aden and off the coast of Soma­lia, stim­u­lat­ing the debate on opti­mis­ing the employ­ment of Ves­sel Pro­tec­tion Detachments. 

Final­ly, the Head of the Mis­sion Head­quar­ters Sup­port Cell of the EU Train­ing Mis­sion (EUTM) Soma­lia pro­vid­ed the CHODs with an overview of the Mis­sion and briefed them on the prepa­ra­tions to deliv­er training.

The capa­bil­i­ties ses­sion was ded­i­cat­ed to the main activ­i­ties launched in the frame­work of the Capa­bil­i­ty Devel­op­ment Plan and to the rec­om­men­da­tions of the Wise Pen Team’s report on Mar­itime Sur­veil­lance. The ses­sion includ­ed a dis­cus­sion on the role of the EUMC in EU capa­bil­i­ty development.

Beside the for­mal ses­sions of the meet­ing, CHODs were updat­ed by Gen. Svy­da, Ukrain­ian Chief of Gen­er­al Staff and Com­man­der-in-Chief, on the trans­for­ma­tion process of the Ukrain­ian Armed Forces and on Ukraine’s pre­pared­ness to con­tribute to region­al secu­ri­ty and Com­mon Secu­ri­ty and Defence Pol­i­cy (CSDP) activ­i­ties, in par­tic­u­lar EUNAVFOR Ata­lan­ta and EU Battlegroups.

More­over Mr. Alain Le Roy, Unit­ed Nations Under-Sec­re­tary Gen­er­al for Peace­keep­ing Oper­a­tions (PKOs), pro­vid­ed CHODs with his per­spec­tives on PKOs and on prac­ti­cal mea­sures to fur­ther strength­en UN peacekeeping.

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The Euro­pean Union Mil­i­tary Com­mit­tee (EUMC) is the high­est mil­i­tary body set up with­in the Coun­cil. It exer­cis­es mil­i­tary direc­tion of all EU mil­i­tary activ­i­ties and pro­vides the Polit­i­cal and Secu­ri­ty Com­mit­tee (PSC) with advice and rec­om­men­da­tions on mil­i­tary mat­ters. The EUMC is com­posed of the Chiefs of Defence (CHOD) of the Mem­ber States, who are reg­u­lar­ly rep­re­sent­ed by their per­ma­nent Mil­i­tary Rep­re­sen­ta­tives (Mil­Reps).

Source:
Coun­cil of the Euro­pean Union