MEPs probe test ruling

Date: 26/10/1995

By Michael Mann

THE European Parliament is to check whether the Commission's decision not to proceed against France over its nuclear test programme was justified.

In the wake of Commission President Jacques Santer's announcement that there were no grounds for legal action against France, MEPs are gearing themselves up to study the data supplied by France to make their own assessment of whether scope remains for court action under Article 34 of the Euratom Treaty.

When it came to the crunch, the Parliament's response to Santer's announcement that the tests could not be deemed “particularly dangerous experiments” was fairly muted - despite earlier suggestions that MEPs might take legal action against the Commission if it ruled out action against the French.

But Socialist Group leader Pauline Green reacted with scepticism, describing the French tests as examples of “20th century colonialism” and accusing France of acting with “disdain and disrespect”. “Most of us were not surprised, it could hardly have been otherwise. But do we believe it?” she asked her fellow MEPs.

The Parliament was due to vote on a resolution condemning the tests today (26 October). Environment committee chairman Ken Collins said yesterday the resolution would be based heavily on motions proposed by the Socialist Group and committees involved in last week's parliamentary hearing on the subject.

“There is no doubt that all groups are united in saying that they don't want the tests,” Collins said, adding that the resolution would also include several findings from the hearing and underline the Parliament's intention to look at data to assess “the scope for further action under Articles 34 and 35 of Euratom”.

Wilfried Martens, for the European Peoples' Party, adopted a more conciliatory tone, saying there was “no evidence or information to cast doubt on the Commission's conclusions” and the Commission had “passed from the passivity of its predecessors” and provided proof that “it took the Parliament seriously”.

It was left to Liberal group leader Gijs de Vries to call for Environment Commissioner Ritt Bjerregaard's resignation. “Mrs Bjerregaard went solo time and time again as the guardian angel with the sword of the Euratom Treaty in her hand. Her credibility is irreparably damaged, she should draw the necessary conclusions and resign,” he claimed.

It came as a surprise to many that the Commission was able to reach its decision by consensus, given the apparent hard line pursued by Bjerregaard since France resumed its testing programme in early September.

Santer's address to the Parliament concluded that “the tests under way do not pose a perceptible risk of significant exposure to workers or the population” and that Article 34 of the treaty did not therefore apply. But he pledged to urge France to carry out long-term monitoring of radioactivity levels “to respond to residual doubts which might remain as regards the geological structure of the atolls”.

Playing down talk of her dissatisfaction with the decision, Bjerregaard told the Parliament of the Commission's “close relations with France, which have not always been problem-free”.

She emphasised the Parliament's “essential role as the spokesman of the EU's citizens” and stressed that the Commission had used evidence from last week's parliamentary hearing in reaching its decision.

“Our decision not to apply Article 34 was based on objective, expert evaluation of the risks involved. We always towed a consistent line as a Commission,” Bjerregaard claimed. The Commission's deliberations had set a framework for implementing Euratom in the future, she said.

The Commission's decision came in the wake of French President Jacques Chirac's commitment to reduce the number of tests under the current programme from eight to a total of six. Bjerregaard described the news as a “glad tiding indeed”, and hoped that the programme would be curtailed further. For Green, however, a reduction was irrelevant.

Unwilling to let the issue fade, she derided the Commission: “I assume they hope that the fuss will now die down.” Clearly, sections of the Parliament are determined not to allow that to happen.