France's top diplomat accuses Ursula von der Leyen of foreign policy overreach

The EU’s external action service, led by Kaja Kallas, must be stronger, Jean-Noël Barrot said

Charles Cohen/

Nicoletta Ionta

Euractiv

The European Commission should not exceed its official mandate by usurping the foreign policy role of the EU’s diplomatic service, French Foreign Affairs Minister Jean-Noël Barrot told EU ambassadors on Monday, at a conference attended by Ursula von der Leyen.

“The Commission must comply with the strictest observance of subsidiarity,” Barrot said on stage at an EU ambassadors’ conference in Brussels, pointing to the EU’s treaties.

France has fallen out with Ursula von der Leyen’s Commission this year over her decision to send one of her team to the inaugural meeting of Donald Trump’s Board of Peace, envisioned as a rival global security structure to the United Nations.

“We are counting on a strong EEAS,” Barrot said, saying the EU’s External Action Service – led by fellow centrist Kaja Kallas – should reiterate the competencies of each EU institution in an upcoming security strategy.

In a speech at the same conference earlier in the day, von der Leyen gave a nod to the Board of Peace, saying: “Every new initiative should aim to complement the UN – not compete or replace it.”

Von der Leyen’s role as the European Union’s de facto foreign policy chief has only become more entrenched since the US and Israeli attacks on Iran began.

But she drew criticism for openly backing a “credible transition for Iran,” widely interpreted as a call for regime change, which some European diplomats in consider a breach of her mandate.

That same weekend she made the rare step of detailing her telephone exchanges with leaders from the Middle East and the Gulf.

There’s been heated rivalry between the Commission and the EEAS, including recent squabbles over the creation of an intelligence cell and the uncoordinated responses to the US and Israeli attacks on Iran.

The Commission president noted in her speech that she is working on the new security strategy with the EEAS.

(ew)