(1) This designation is without prejudice to positions on status, and is in line with UNSCR 1244/1999 and the ICJ Opinion on the Kosovo declaration of independence.
Budget for 2021-2027
(million EUR)
Financial programming | 2 681.5 |
NextGenerationEU |
|
Decommitments made available again (*) | N/A |
Contributions from other countries and entities | 0.0 |
Total budget 2021-2027 | 2 681.5 |
(*) Only Article 15(3) of the financial regulation.
Rationale and design of the programme
The common foreign and security policy (CFSP) contributes to the EU’s objectives of preserving peace, strengthening international security, promoting international cooperation and developing and consolidating democracy, the rule of law and respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms.
The EU faces several ongoing challenges in international security and stability. Key ones include organised crime, terrorism, people smuggling, irregular migration, the proliferation of conventional weapons and weapons of mass destruction, and security threats stemming from weak rule of law in some non-EU countries.
It is therefore essential for the EU to support non-EU countries in their related reforms, such as security sector reform and help them establish efficient civilian security services, thereby increasing their capacities to tackle internal and external security challenges.
Article 21 of the Treaty on European Union defines the common overarching principles and objectives of the EU’s external action, which are namely to ‘preserve peace, prevent conflicts and strengthen international security’. While the individual activities of Member States clearly contribute to achieving the goals of the EU’s CFSP, the combined political weight of the EU as a whole helps to provide a critical mass to respond to global challenges. Regarding non-proliferation and disarmament activities, the EU’s support provides significant benefits for the universalisation and effective implementation of international treaties, conventions and agreements addressing the proliferation of both conventional arms and weapons of mass destruction, including their delivery mechanisms.
The CFSP actions aim to ensure the EU’s ability to act and intervene to address civilian crises and to promote nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament through support for multilateral action. Interventions in both areas help the EU ‘preserve peace, prevent conflict and strengthen international security’, as envisaged under Article 21 of the Treaty on European Union.
The CFSP pursues two specific objectives:
- to promote international cooperation in the field of security sector reform, to develop and consolidate democracy and rule of law, and promote human rights and fundamental freedoms;
- to promote strategic cooperation with international partners on the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and on combating the illicit accumulation of small arms and light weapons and other conventional weapons, and to support the EU policy on conventional arms exports.
The CFSP pursues its objectives by the following means:
- Different types of civilian common security and defence policy (CSDP) missions, depending on the Council of the European Union’s mandate, for example advisory missions counselling host countries on drafting legislation in the security sector, or capacity-building missions providing hands-on operational activities.
- Different types of mandates of EU special representatives promoting EU policies all around the world.
- Actions related to non-proliferation and disarmament. These are implemented through agreements with international organisations, notably within the United Nations family, and for specific purposes with other select organisations in the field of non-proliferation and disarmament.
The CFSP is implemented primarily through indirect management for civilian CSDP missions and non-proliferation and disarmament actions, and to a lesser extent through direct management. The political direction of these actions is under the Political and Security Committee (PSC) and the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy. The mandates of the civilian CSDP missions are agreed by the EU Member States. The lead service for the programming of CFSP actions is the European External Action Service, while the Commission is responsible for ensuring the sound financial management of the funds.
The CFSP is implemented on the basis of individual decisions adopted by the Council. Under Articles 42(4) and 43(2) of the Treaty on European Union, the Council adopts the legal framework for civilian CSDP missions. On the basis of Article 28 of the treaty, Member States may decide to launch operational actions, for example stabilisation actions. As regards actions in the field of non-proliferation and disarmament, the Council adopts decisions on the basis of Articles 28(1) and 31(1) of the treaty.
The main share of funds is allocated to the budget lines in support of civilian CSDP missions to assist partner countries in border management, conflict prevention, combating organised crime and smuggling, reforming national security sectors or monitoring the judicial system and the rule of law. Missions provide advice and training to local security sector actors and implement small-scale projects.
The European Union special representatives are independent CFSP entities that support the work of the High Representative in key regions and countries. They are appointed by the Council and entrusted with a mandate in relation to a particular policy issue.
CFSP-funded non-proliferation and disarmament actions contribute to the universalisation and implementation of international treaties and conventions addressing the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, support measures to control the spreading of small arms and light weapons and promote effective arms export controls around the world. Actions are implemented through partner organisations, in particular from the United Nations, and for specific purposes with other select organisations in the field of non-proliferation and disarmament.
Under the 2021-2027 multiannual financial framework, the CFSP remains a separate tool, but complementary with other conflict and crisis response instruments, for example the rapid response pillar of the Neighbourhood, Development and International Cooperation Instrument. It is expected to provide continued strong support for the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and disarmament, with increased levels of support to match Member States’ ambitions.
Programme website:
Impact assessment:
- Reports on the implementation of the CFSP are produced annually by the European External Action Service. For further information, please consult the CFSP annual reports.
Relevant regulation:
- Tasks are resulting from the European Commission’s prerogatives at institutional level, as provided for in Article 58(2) of Regulation (EU, Euratom) 2018/1046 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 18 July 2018 on the financial rules applicable to the general budget of the Union.
The CFSP is implemented on the basis of individual decisions adopted by the Council.
Under Articles 42(4) and 43(2) of the Treaty on European Union, the Council adopts the legal framework for civilian CSDP missions.
On the basis of Article 28 of the treaty, Member States may decide to launch operational actions, for example stabilisation actions.
As regards actions in the field of non-proliferation and disarmament, the Council adopts decisions on the basis of Articles 28(1) and 31(1) of the treaty.
Budget
Budget programming (million EUR):
| 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 | 2026 | 2027 | Total | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Financial programming | 352.2 | 361.7 | 371.8 | 384.7 | 392.7 | 403.6 | 414.7 | 2 681.5 |
| NextGenerationEU | ||||||||
| Decommitments made available again (*) | N/A | |||||||
| Contributions from other countries and entities | 0.0 | 0.0 | p.m. | p.m. | p.m. | p.m. | p.m. | 0.0 |
| Total | 352.2 | 361.7 | 371.8 | 384.7 | 392.7 | 403.6 | 414.7 | 2 681.5 |
(*) Only Article 15(3) of the financial regulation.
Financial programming:
+ EUR 2.8 million (+ 0%)
compared to the legal basis*
(*) Top-ups pursuant to Article 5 of the multiannual financial framework regulation are excluded from financial programming in this comparison.
Budget performance – implementation
Annual voted budget implementation (million EUR) (1):
| Commitments | Payments | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Voted budget implementation | Initial voted budget | Voted budget implementation | Initial voted budget | |
| 2021 | 352.0 | 351.9 | 345.9 | 328.7 |
| 2022 | 361.7 | 361.7 | 383.1 | 333.6 |
(1) Voted appropriations (C1) only.
- CFSP actions funded under the 2014-2020 multiannual financial framework are still being implemented, and there is a direct and strong link between the CFSP actions implemented under the 2014-2020 multiannual financial framework and the new 2021-2027 multiannual financial framework.
- In 2021 and 2022, the Service for Foreign Policy Instruments committed and paid 100% of the available appropriations to cover CFSP entities mainly operating through indirect management, as nominated by Member States in the corresponding Council decisions.
- However, the Commission had to implement a growing number of mitigating measures due to the mismatch of political ambitions of Member States and the availability of CFSP funds. This involved splitting commitments for the first year of the mandates of several missions between the 2022 and 2023 budget years (and in one case even between 2022, 2023 and 2024), as well as partial decommitments for two actions. It also increased the workload of the service managing the funds. One of the main challenges is the structural oversubscription of the CFSP budget. Political ambitions from EU Member States in the Council are not aligned anymore with the available resources. The Commission has launched, together with the European External Action Service, a process to introduce some structural measures to generate savings and render the budget sustainable again. However, missions continue to struggle with the full implementation of their originally requested budgets. The Commission has therefore inter alia proposed to allocate budgets based on past absorption rates.
- For 2023, the initial list of planned missions, European Union special representatives and non-proliferation and disarmament actions already exceeds the available commitment and payment credits. Two new civilian CSDP missions (Armenia and Moldova) are being launched in.
- For 2024, the renewal of ongoing civilian CSDP missions, EU special representatives and non-proliferation and disarmament actions will already consume/exceed the requested commitment and payment appropriations. The Commission will continue to propose/implement mitigating measures to try and create some margin for new actions / urgent situations.
Contribution to horizontal priorities
Green budgeting
Contribution to green budgeting priorities (million EUR):
| Implementation | Estimates | Total | % of the 2021-2027 budget | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 | 2026 | 2027 | |||
| Climate mainstreaming | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0 | 0% |
| Biodiversity mainstreaming | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0 | 0% |
| Clean air |
0.0 |
0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0 | 0% |
CFSP actions and CSDP entities are not designed to tackle the green priorities, as is the case with action documents under cooperation instruments.
Some entities have internal procedures favouring green procurement. However, as operations mainly focus on providing advice and developing capacities in the civilian security sector, their impact on the abovementioned horizontal issues remains very limited.
Gender
Contribution to gender equality (million EUR) (*):
| Gender Score | 2021 | 2022 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Score 0 |
337.0 |
341.0 |
678.0 |
|
Score 1 |
14.9 |
16.2 |
31.1 |
|
Score 2 |
0.0 | 4.5 | 4.5 |
(*) Based on the applied gender contribution methodology, the following scores are attributed at the most granular level of intervention possible:
- 2: interventions the principal objective of which is to improve gender equality;
- 1: interventions that have gender equality as an important and deliberate objective but not as the main reason for the intervention;
- 0: non-targeted interventions;
- 0*: score to be assigned to interventions with a likely but not yet clear positive impact on gender equality.
- Gender equality is addressed in some policies governing civilian CSDP missions (e.g. in the recruitment of international mission members) and is explicitly part of the mandate of certain CSDP missions. However, as operations mainly focus on providing advice and developing capacities in the civilian security sector, the impact on gender equality remains rather limited.
- To provide one example of the challenges faced in this respect, it is a declared aim to increase the percentage of female staff in missions (ideally to 40%). However, missions are to a large extent staffed by expert staff seconded from EU Member States. With a low percentage of seconded staff being female (this is also related to the generally lower rate of female experts in the civilian security sector), it becomes very difficult to achieve quantitative policy objectives, as their achievement is to a significant degree out of the control of civilian CSDP missions
- In addition to the commitments under the voted budget presented above, the following commitments were made with credits coming from recoveries:
2021: score 1: + EUR 2 million; score 0: + EUR 53.4 million;
2022: score 0: + EUR 24.4 million.
Digital
Contribution to digital transition (million EUR):
| 2021 implementation | 2022 implementation | Total | % of the total 2021-2027 implementation | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Digital contribution | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0% |
The CFSP does not target the digital transition.
Budget performance – outcomes
| Baseline | Progress (*) | Target | Results | Assessment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Percentage of contribution agreements with EU special representatives and civilian CSDP missions signed within 4 weeks after the adoption of the Council decision | 0 | 66% | 100% in 2028 | Average for 2021 to 2022: 66%, compared to a target of 100%. | Deserves attention |
| Percentage of civilian CSDP missions coordinating with interventions financed under other EU instruments | 0 | 100% | 100% annually between 2021 and 2027 | Average for 2021 to 2022: 100%, compared to a target of 100% | On track |
| Percentage of positively pillar (or similar) assessed civilian CSDP missions not requiring supervisory measures | 0 | 99% | 100% in 2028 | Average for 2021 to 2022: 99%, compared to a target of 100%. | On track |
| Percentage of relevant non-proliferation and disarmament actions that are complementary to actions funded under the peace, stability and conflict prevention programme of the Neighbourhood, Development and International Cooperation Instrument – Global Europe | 0 | 100% | 100% annually between 2021 and 2027 | Average for 2021 to 2022: 100%, compared to a target of 100% | On track |
(*) Average of results compared to average of milestones during the 2021-2022 period.
Link to file with complete set of EU core performance indicators
- The EU has significantly enhanced its operational capacity and footprint in recent years thanks to the key contributions to global peace and security of the 11 CSDP missions and operations within the framework of the EU’s integrated approach to external conflicts and crises. This improves the security of the EU and its citizens.
- The European Commission provided the necessary funds in a timely manner through contribution agreements, which ensured the missions’ operational capacity. The funds allowed the recruitment and training of staff by the missions and the provision of the logistical support to carry out the operations. Nevertheless, civilian missions operating in sometimes insecure environments are facing continuous difficulties in recruiting the required number of staff with the necessary skills to carry out the relevant job functions.
- In 2022, the Commission continued to support efforts to curb the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and the illicit accumulation and trafficking of small arms, light weapons and other conventional weapons by implementing 31 non-proliferation and disarmament actions. It is too early to draw any conclusions when assessing the impact of the actions launched during the ongoing multiannual financial framework, as many are only in the early stages of implementation.
- In general terms, despite delays due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the actions launched during the previous multiannual financial framework perform well when measured against the indicators in the logical frameworks.
- The actions effectively supported the implementation of various non-proliferation treaties, conventions and other instruments or programmes by non-EU countries. This was achieved by strengthening the capacities of their relevant national authorities through training courses, workshops, study visits and other activities and by providing legal assistance, infrastructure investment and equipment. They also effectively supported the documentation and tracing of diverted or trafficked conventional arms and their ammunition, the disposal of surplus or confiscated small arms and light weapons and investigations into the alleged use of chemical weapons, along with outreach activities to support the universalisation of the various non-proliferation treaties, conventions and instruments.
- Following Russia’s unprovoked, unjustified and unjustifiable military aggression against Ukraine, the Commission worked with the International Atomic Energy Agency to amend the action in support of the agency’s activities in the area of nuclear security to include its assistance to Ukraine in the field of nuclear security.
- For indicator ‘Percentage of contribution agreements with EU special representatives and civilian CSDP missions signed within 4 weeks after the adoption of the Council decision’, the result in 2022 is significantly below the milestone. This has to be regarded as an exception. In some cases, signatures were only a few days late. The reasons for the large number of delayed signatures relate to late presentations of operational plans and last-minute changes to the contract templates, both of which are out of the Commission’s control. Members of staff were reminded again of the necessity to start procedures sufficiently in advance to meet this target.
- For the indicator on supervisory measures, the Commission has launched pillar assessments of new missions. However, given that a pillar assessment can take over a year, adding new entities will prevent the Commission from achieving 100% in relation to this indicator.
- Being able to deliver with the CFSP budget will largely depend on the political will to generate savings, creating more budgetary space and thus the necessary flexibility to address new and upcoming emergencies and priorities.
Sustainable development goals
Contribution to the sustainable development goals
| SDGs the programme contributes to | Example |
|---|---|
| SDG16 Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels |
Example 1: Civilian CSDP missions to support the reduction of violence Civilian CSDP missions are contributing, among other aspects, to the reduction of the number of victims, for example when handling protests by the host-nation authorities. Specialised training offered by the European Union Advisory Mission in Iraq to the police forces in terms of the use of force and exercising restraint has proved efficient in minimising the number of casualties following the police interventions. For example, the Iraqi security forces showed an increased level of professionalism and restraint when handling the recent protests and violent clashes in August/September 2022, with a significantly reduced number of victims than in the past – 30 killed in August/September 2022 compared to 560 in October 2019–mid 2020. The EU’s commitment for the European Union Advisory Mission in Iraq in 2022 was EUR 34.55 million. Example 2: Arms control and non-proliferation The iTrace IV action contributed to the prevention of diversion and illicit trafficking of conventional arms and their ammunition by documenting and tracing those arms and ammunition. In 2020-2022, the iTrace IV action documented 1 645 conventional weapons and 29 719 rounds of ammunition in conflict-affected areas, including Afghanistan, Northeast Syria, Somalia and the Sahel region. The iTrace IV action also sent 1 854 trace requests to national authorities of the arms exporting states and received 621 responses. The maximum EU contribution for the iTrace IV action is EUR 5.5 million. |