Fifty years ago today six European countries came together to create a unique form of regional organization with the aim of ensuring that war would never again ravage the European continent, leaving a trail of death and devastation.
Over the years the EU has evolved to be much more than a simple trading bloc coordinating members’ trade policy and setting common tariffs. Now numbering 27 members, the EU today is a political organization active in all the areas that pose the greatest challenges to society in the 21st century, the European Commissioner for External Relations and Neighbourhood Policy, Benita Ferrero-Waldner said in an anniversary message.
“For countries around the world that means we are no longer just a trading partner. Now we are a strategic partner for issues as varied as international terrorism, climate change, HIV/AIDS, and resolving the world’s most entrenched conflicts,” she noted.
Ferrero-Waldner observed too that the EU is already the world’s largest donor of international assistance, currently providing 60% of the world’s official development assistance, over euro 7 billion.
“The EU is not a finished story. Our institutions and powers are still evolving and nowhere is that more true than in the area of foreign policy.” She added that it is already clear that their partners see them as a different kind of partner than the purely trading partner they once were. “They see the strategic value of greater cooperation with us, just as we see the strategic value of greater cooperation with them,” Ferrero-Waldner said.
