The Irish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament has no wish to impede
or delay the accession of applicant states to the European Union.
The Treaty of Nice is unnecessary for enlargement, since the Treaty
of Amsterdam provides a framework for up to 5 additional member
states, and the detailed arrangements for further members can
be worked out in the treaties of accession for those countries.
There is no obstacle to the accession of all the present applicants,
since treaties of accession have never been submitted to referendum
as they do not diminish the powers of the Oireachtas or Government.
Treaties of accession contain provisions for the alteration of
the numbers of the Commission, European Parliament, Economic and
Social Committee, and Committee of the Regions, and for the alteration
of the number of votes allocated to states in the Council: these
provisions account for some of the agenda which the Treaty of
Nice addressed.
Many of the other provisions in the Treaty of Nice dealt with
issues which do not raise any problems in terms of handing over
power to the European level, and if they are felt to be urgent
a treaty dealing with these questions could be quickly drafted
and accepted by national parliaments. It is not even certain that
all proposals for moves from unanimity to qualified majority voting
require a constitutional referendum.
The decision of the Irish people to reject the Treaty of Nice
should be respected, as the electoral register of 2002 will be
very similar to that of 2001. At all previous referendums the
people were assured that further transfers of power could only
occur by unanimity: the Oireachtas should insist that the other
members of the European Union live up to this guarantee enshrined
in the Treaties.
It has recently been decided to call a Convention to plan the
next stage of reform of the European institutions. The inadequate,
rushed and confused procedure by which the Treaty of Nice was
agreed upon has been commented on widely, and the more deliberate
and coherent approach of drafting a new treaty (or constitution
as some wish to call it) at the Convention and bringing it then
to an intergovernmental conference may produce a more satisfactory
result. The outstanding business from the Nice Treaty would obviously
have to be considered as part of this process. It is of course
necessary to associate the candidate countries with this discussion
as it affects their interests and concerns, and they will have
an opportunity to formally participate in the Convention, as they
did not in the case of the Treaty of Nice.
The reason why Irish CND opposed the Treaty of Nice was that it
proposed to expand the ties between Ireland and the military side
of the European Union, which is linked to NATO institutions. A
tie between Ireland and NATO conflicts with Ireland's traditional
status of neutrality, which is in conformity with article 29 of
the Constitution pledging Ireland to seek the pacific settlement
of international disputes. The policy of neutrality has been undermined
by previous decisions such as the decision to enter the Partnership
for Peace without a referendum, and further erosion of neutrality
is undesirable. Neutrality for Ireland has not meant a policy
of non-engagement under any circumstances, but a position of non-alignment
which does not tie Ireland into the expectations of other countries
but leaves it free to help peacekeeping where the Government and
D°il think it is appropriate. The definition of neutrality
as the lack of a mutual defence commitment is not part of the
traditional definition of Irish neutrality, being only introduced
in the Foreign Affairs White Paper of 1996.
A tie with NATO links Ireland to an alliance whose strategy involves
the threat of the use of nuclear weapons, two of the states possessing
nuclear weapons being EU member states. The use of nuclear weapons
was outlawed in almost all conceivable circumstances by an Advisory
Opinion of the International Court of Justice in 1996. A tie with
the nuclear arsenals of Britain and France makes it more difficult
to secure the ending of the civilian use of nuclear power, since
nuclear warheads, even if not upgraded, need to be replaced periodically
with radioactive material produced in dual-use (military/civilian)
facilities.
February 2002