The European Union (EU) has started to answer Henry Kissinger’s famous question, “who do I call if I want to speak to Europe?”

EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs Catherine Ashton attends a press conference for the proposal of European External Action Services(EEAS) in Brussels, Belgium, on March 25, 2010.

“We are well on track to get the service in place. I am hopeful that we can reach an agreement swiftly in the European Council supported by the European Parliament and the European Commission,” Ashton told a press conference held amid the EU’s spring summit on March 25 and 26.

The EEAS, which has its headquarters in Brussels, shall be a functionally autonomous body of the EU, separate from the commission and the General Secretatiat of the council, with the legal capacity necessary to perform its tasks and attain its objectives.

According to the proposal, the EEAS will cooperate with the general secretariat of the council and the services of the commission as well as with the diplomatic services of the member states in order to ensure consistency between the different areas of the external action and between these and its other policies.

To ensure the effective day-to-day administration and operation of the EEAS, the high representative shall appoint a secretary- general, two deputy secretaries-general, working under the latter’ s authority, and the directors general of the new diplomatic service.

The directorates general of the EEAS shall include geographical desks covering all countries and regions of the world as well as multilateral and thematic desks.

The EEAS will also comprise administrative, staffing, financial and other support services necessary for the functioning of the service.

“The college of commissioners agreed on a proposal of the revision of the financial regulation, and the first step in the revision of the staff regulation,” Ashton said.

The high representative emphasized that it is in everyone’s interest to have the EEAS up and running as soon as possible.

“We need the EEAS because we have to adapt to a world of growing complexity and a fundamental power shift,” Ashton said. ” We can only punch our weight if we are able to bring together all the instruments, economic, political, development and security, crisis management and long term engagement in support of the single political strategy.”

Lisbon Treaty which came into force last December clearly insists in bringing together the European Commission external system programs with the Common Foreign and Security Policy, which has been defined by Maastricht Treaty in 1993.

“We generally agreed that the service will follow the principles of single geographic and thematic desk, covering the all world and key global issues,” Ashton said, adding that it will help deliver a comprehensive and strategic approach to the relation with thirds country.

“The way the EU works in many countries is much greater than traditional diplomacy,” Ashton said. “The difference is that it becomes more coherent.”

“So if you are looking at it from the outside, you don’t see different things but Europe,” Ashton said.

However, critics say, with its new foreign chief Catherine Ashton and a permanent president Herman Van Rompuy, there is a risk of the EU’s Lisbon Treaty creating an even larger cacophony of European voices on the world stage.

As the European Policy Center’s Missiroli puts it, “with the exception of trade, where the EU 27 speaks with one voice and concentrates on their common interests, Europea risks being at the same time overrepresented and underperforming on the global stage. “

If representation in international fora is considered, the EU is in fact rarely represented as a bloc on its own. France, Germany, Italy and Britain are present in the G20, where so far the EU has also been represented by the rotating EU presidency as the 20th member of the group.

VietNamNet/Xinhuanet