EUHR Solana's address on 'The limits of integration - Where does the European Union end?'

It is an honour to be at this prestigious gathering. The panel has been invited to discuss the theme of the limits of European integration - and in particular the question of where does the European Union end?

I want to offer a few thoughts of my own before giving way to the panel discussion. The boundaries of the Union - in every sense - take different forms and have evolved over time.

I want to share three quite simple thoughts with you this morning. First: borders matter less. Second: while the extent of states has become less relevant, so the content of the state has become more important. And thirdly: in a world where the most potent threats transcend borders, so must the responses.

Part of the attraction of the European Union is that it has made borders less relevant. We marvel at the ease with which we cross frontiers. Where once we queued, today we barely slow down. Where once we needed passports, visas and currency exchange, today we need not worry. Lines on maps that defined and divided us for centuries now seem barely perceptible.

Some worry that as the relevance of the Union's internal borders has diminished, so that of its external borders has increased. Our neighbours fear that, as we in the Union remove some borders, we will put up new ones in their place.

Such anxiety is natural, but I do not believe that it is well founded. We did not help tear down one iron curtain simply to construct another in its place.

Some of our neighbours are negotiating membership of the Union. Others will follow in their wake. All prospective members of the Union must have a realistic understanding of the obligations as well as the benefits involved.

We are more than a marketplace. We are a Union of shared values and interests. The pooling of sovereignty makes the process we call "European integration" more than just regional economic integration. We are a political Union also.

In other words, the extent of the European Union cannot be separated from its content.

All members - old, new, and future ones - need to understand and fulfil these obligations.
We do not want the benefits of the Union to end abruptly at its external borders. Nor do we want the benefits of the Union to be reserved solely to those countries that are current or future members.

Why not? Because, the Union cannot exist as an island of peace, prosperity and stability within a wider sea of turmoil. That is why, whether our neighbours will one day be members or not, we are working to ensure that they can share in a wider zone of comfort.

We are working to this end in the Balkans. And we are also looking to our borders with a vast arc of countries. That arc stretches from Morocco, along the length of the southern shores of the Mediterranean, to Jordan and Syria, through the Southern Caucasus, and encompassing Moldova, Ukraine and Belarus.

This attention to neighbours is not new. Soon, we celebrate ten years of partnership with the countries of the Mediterranean region. This partnership is a success story. But we must be more ambitious still.

The Union's borders must be lines that connect not lines that divide. We must also take care that new and higher borders do not form among and between our neighbours.

The European Union is powerfully attractive to many of our neighbours. But we must avoid a pattern of connections that point only to a single magnetic pole. All roads should not lead to Brussels.

Our neighbours must deepen their own bilateral and regional relationships. That is why, with both our Balkan and Mediterranean neighbours, we place such emphasis on intra-regional integration.

In Europe and beyond, borders no longer provide the insularity they once did. All around the world, the division of "us" from "them" has weakened. This is due both to the advance of technology and to the expansion of human freedom.

As a result, we live in an era of easy travel and instant global communication. People, goods, ideas, diseases, fashions, information - all move around our world with unprecedented speed. The consequences for our societies have been profound. It affects who we are, what we think, and how we respond.

Not many of us live in states that are truly ethnically homogenous. Most of our societies enjoy varying degrees of multi-nationalism. This may give us useful insights into other parts of the world, but it also means that segments of our populations have an important stake in issues and conflicts around the world.

In an inter-connected, inter-dependent world chaos cannot easily be contained. Containing chaos is difficult, but ignoring it is impossible. The power of television means that even the most distant crisis finds its way into our living rooms. The borders between domestic and foreign policy are breaking down. The linkage between internal and external security is becoming stronger.

We face new opportunities and new threats. All of us - policy-makers, parliamentarians, citizens - need to reflect on how best to realise the opportunities and how best to confront the threats.

The starting point must be to create stable frameworks of law and physical security. We must look to what lies within the borders of states. Strengthening the capacity to govern, effectively and legitimately, will be key to success in countries as diverse as Afghanistan, Iraq and Haiti. Borders matter less, but the capacities of governments matter more.

Almost a year ago EU heads of state and government adopted a European Security Strategy. At the heart of this strategy is the belief that multi-national challenges require multi-national responses.

No single country has the wisdom, resources, or patience to tackle today's challenges alone. Because the most urgent contemporary challenges are trans-national in character, they can be tackled only as a co-operative venture.

But multilateralism must be effective. It must be action-oriented and capable of delivering results.

That does not mean that the Union's Member States will have a diminished role in future. But it does mean that the European Union will have to do more and do better. It must become a more effective and a more coherent actor in international affairs.

Achieving that goal will mean removing some remaining borders - borders of a functional kind.

In the last twenty years the Union has done a fantastic job of spreading prosperity, democracy and stability on our continent.

It has done so by removing borders between our members, and by extending the outer limits of those borders. Our borders are set to extend further still.

But the main challenge for the coming twenty years will be how best to spread prosperity, democracy and stability beyond our borders.

Thank you very much.

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