EU defence clause: let’s talk about the leak in Slovenia that trickles all the way to Ireland

DOES it take a leak in Slovenia to allow us to hope for an honest debate in Ireland?

The Treaty of Lisbon contains a mutual defence clause.

This is a new departure for the EU. The existing EC and EU treaties contain no mutual defence clause. Whatever one may think of the wisdom of the new departure, it deserves to be debated.

Instead its existence is not even acknowledged — it is flatly denied. One could almost understand the level of denial on the part of our Government, committed as it is politically to getting this treaty approved. One would have hoped for better from the National Forum on Europe.

Astonishingly, a reader of the forum’s Guide to Lisbon will see no discussion there of this change in Ireland’s defence policy.

There is instead a passing reference to the clause suggesting it only has relevance to certain EU states which are involved in something the guide calls “closer co-operation” — a term that does not appear in this part of the Lisbon Treaty. Taoiseach Bertie Ahern and Foreign Minister Dermot Ahern have asserted that the Lisbon treaty has no new military implications that we need to be concerned about. Anyone who dares to suggest otherwise is portrayed as a scaremonger.

Soothing but irrelevant words are churned out about triple locks and constitutional guarantees, while the single most significant military change under the treaty is carefully and deliberately ignored.

Until now perhaps.

Thanks to the media, and to the unknown leaker of the secret EU presidency document prepared in Slovenia, we now have the EU presidency’s word for it — article 28A.7 of the Lisbon Treaty is a mutual defence clause.

As the leaked document shows, it applies to all EU members once Lisbon comes into force. Ireland is on a threshold.

The truth is out there now. Let’s talk about it.

Joe Noonan

2 York Terrace

York Hill

Cork