News Release
Let's Put Away the Megaphones; A Trans-Atlantic Appeal
By Chris
Patten and Pascal Lamy (NYT)
International Herald Tribune,
Wednesday, April 9, 2003
BRUSSELS:
The last few fractious weeks have been miserable for those of us who believe in
European unity, in a strong trans-Atlantic
partnership, in NATO and in an authoritative role for the United Nations.
Tempers have flared. But let us not forget a few home truths.
We should remind ourselves,
first, how much the United States and Europe need one another. A study
just issued by the Center for Transatlantic Relations
reveals that for most of the past decade, Europe
has accounted for half of total global earnings of US companies. Over the past
eight years, US investment in the Netherlands alone was twice what it was in Mexico
and ten times what it was in China. And there is more European investment in Texas
than US investment in Japan. So it would be hard to exaggerate the mutual economic
interests of the United States and Europe.
But the stakes, of course,
are much higher than that. The real point is that the United States was born of
Europe's rib. We have common roots in the European Enlightenment, and we share
the body of ideas that emerged from that period of emancipation from received
authority. We have worked together over the last half-century to fashion an international
legal order covering not just trade and
security, but human rights, too, and fundamental freedoms.
However sharp our differences
from time to time, and however loudly we may shout at one another, we have a very
similar underlying worldview, such as in our shared opposition to "total
solutions"—whether
of communism, national socialism or religious fundamentalism.
Those who urge President
George W. Bush to walk away from the United Nations because they believe that,
in Charles Krauthammer's words, "the principal purpose of the Security Council
is not to restrain tyrants but to restrain the United States" are unworthy
of the great generation of US statesmen who built up the rule of law through global
institutions fifty and more years ago. Luckily they represent a small minority
in a United States that remains determinedly internationalist.
As we feel our way through
a very difficult time, not just in trans-Atlantic relations but within Europe,
too, it is important that high emotions do not cause us to exaggerate our differences
on foreign policy. None of us disagrees about the need to rid Iraq
of weapons of mass destruction. Nor have we any doubt that Iraq would be better
off without Saddam Hussein.
What lesson to draw as policymakers?
That Europe and America should work to preserve common interests, to minimize
their differences and to maximize their joint influence for good.
That means redoubling our
work together to strengthen the world's defenses against international terrorism.
There is already a great deal of often technical and unglamorous work going on
across the Atlantic over a wide agenda, covering everything from the security
of container traffic and airlines to mutual extradition agreements. We must push
ahead, not least to ensure that new initiatives like this home in effectively
on curbing terrorism and do not inadvertently restrict international trade and
investment.
It means working harder
than ever to develop our successful cooperation in the Balkans
after the horrors of the 1990s. The Dayton Accords could not have been negotiated,
nor the war in Kosovo won, without America—yet
it is the European Union that is now the major force for stability in the region.
The prospect of future
EU membership provides essential underpinning as these countries struggle
to regain prosperity and freedom. Not only is the EU by far the single largest
assistance donor to the countries of the western Balkans, but we provide most
of the peacekeeping troops, too.
It is much the same story
in Afghanistan, where the EU has a bigger military presence than the United States
and is the bigger donor—but
we cooperate closely in the service of a single strategy.
A major test over the coming
weeks and months will be the Middle
East peace process, and the wider challenge of helping countries throughout
the region to cope with the fallout from the war in Iraq. The United States and
the EU have worked with Russia and with the United Nations on a road map to an
outcome that would guarantee both Israel and Palestine statehood and security
within internationally recognized borders. The truth is that most people in the
region—rightly or wrongly—believe
that the United States represents the interests of Israel. The United States cannot,
therefore, play the honest broker alone, and there will be no lasting settlement
without trans-Atlantic and wider regional cooperation.
On trade and economic policy,
we need to make real progress before the next EU-US
summit meeting in June. First, we need to keep the Doha
round of negotiations on track for completion in 2004 by working together
to ensure that the World Trade Organization ministerial meeting in Cancún in September
is a success. Second, we need to work harder than ever to promote WTO-compatible
solutions, given that we still have a number of difficult trade
disputes to manage. Third, we must advance the positive
agenda on trade, solving disputes before they go into the WTO process.
There has been plenty of
talk recently, in both the EU and United States, about the need to insulate trade
and economics from the war. Of course. But we have to make that happen. It is
not a question of crossing our fingers, but of rolling up our sleeves.
We write this article as
citizens of two countries, France and Britain, that find their own relations strained
by current events. Our simple appeal is that people on all sides of the debate
over Iraq put away their megaphones, acknowledge how much unites us across the
Atlantic and recognize our shared responsibility to provide international leadership.
Chris
Patten is EU External
Relations Commissioner and Pascal
Lamy is Trade Commissioner.
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