Paris, 6 September 2002: The WEU Council has extended the term of office of Mr Javier Solana as Secretary-General of WEU to 24 November 2004. Mr Solana, who is also Secretary-General of the EU Council and the EU High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy, was appointed Secretary-General of WEU on 25 November 1999 for a period of three years with an option for a further two. The WEU Council took the latest decision on 24 July 2002.
Assembly President Klaus Bühler congratulated Mr Solana in a letter in which he expresses his expectations that the close cooperation between the national parliaments represented in the Assembly and the Council, its member states and the Secretariat-General will continue.
Mr Solana is a regular speaker at the Assembly’s sessions. The institutional dialogue between the Assembly and the Council includes meetings in Brussels and Paris and in the capital of the WEU Presidency.
According to the provisions of the modified Brussels Treaty, the Council is under an obligation to provide the Assembly with a written annual report on its activities and reply to recommendations voted by the Assembly on all matters arising under the Treaty.
Commenting on the current debate on institutional reform of the European Union. Mr Bühler said: “These provisions give national parliaments important rights to be informed and consulted. I very much hope that the Convention on the future of Europe finds a way of involving national parliaments collectively in the work of the EU Council on the basis of our experience with the WEU Council.”
He stressed that “A mere conference-type format such as COSAC, to which the EU Council has no obligations, which cannot vote recommendations and which does not have a permanent secretariat, would not constitute an appropriate system for the collective involvement of national parliaments in security and defence issues.”
Download the Assembly’s contribution to the Convention on the role of national parliaments here: Document 1778

Download the annual report of the Council here: Document 1774