At a time when public opinion about the EU is at an all-time low, the European Union is refashioning itself as a global entity.
At the heart of the EU’s global aspirations is the European External Action Service (EEAS). Headed by Baroness Ashton (right) and financed with an annual budget of 5.8 billion, the EEAS is launching the European Union into a global movement.
Ashton is a peer appointed by Tony Blair and nominated by Gordon Brown to be the EU's foreign secretary. Though Ashton has never actually won an election in her life, she will be representing democracy to all the nations of the world.
As EU foreign secretary, Ashton will be paid £ 313,213 a year. Her annual pension after five years will be £62,925, and this does not include the £445,674 she will get when she leaves Brussels.
EEAS funds 7,000 officials to work in the EU’s foreign policy. This includes having ambassadors across 137 embassies. 132 EU diplomats are assigned to Turkey, 46 on the Caribbean holiday island of Barbados, 124 in America, 49 in Pakistan, 113 in Russia, 57 in Vietnam, 95 in Ukraine, 31 in Yemen, 29 in Tajikistan, 92 in Morocco, 53 in Madagascar, 85 in Afghanistan, 96 in Bosnia-Herzegovina, 91 in India, 59 in Burkina Faso, 21 in Costa Rica, 90 in Egypt, 57 in Vietnam, 20 in East Timor, 18 in Djibouti, 46 in Mauritania, 39 in Mauritius, 26 in Namibia, 27 in Papua New Guinea, 26 in Laos, 58 in Sudan, 16 in Paraguay, 16 in Swaziland, 103 EU diplomats in Serbia, 63 EU diplomats in Albania, 48 in Sierra Leone, and more diplomats in more than 100 other countries through to the tiny nation of Vanuatu in the Pacific which will have 6.
EEAS funds 7,000 officials to work in the EU’s foreign policy. This includes having ambassadors across 137 embassies. 132 EU diplomats are assigned to Turkey, 46 on the Caribbean holiday island of Barbados, 124 in America, 49 in Pakistan, 113 in Russia, 57 in Vietnam, 95 in Ukraine, 31 in Yemen, 29 in Tajikistan, 92 in Morocco, 53 in Madagascar, 85 in Afghanistan, 96 in Bosnia-Herzegovina, 91 in India, 59 in Burkina Faso, 21 in Costa Rica, 90 in Egypt, 57 in Vietnam, 20 in East Timor, 18 in Djibouti, 46 in Mauritania, 39 in Mauritius, 26 in Namibia, 27 in Papua New Guinea, 26 in Laos, 58 in Sudan, 16 in Paraguay, 16 in Swaziland, 103 EU diplomats in Serbia, 63 EU diplomats in Albania, 48 in Sierra Leone, and more diplomats in more than 100 other countries through to the tiny nation of Vanuatu in the Pacific which will have 6.
These diplomats are trained not to represent their own nations, even though they are citizens of them. Mary Ellen Synon commented that
Two-thirds of the EU diplomats will be career Eurocrats who have been taught to take no special thought or consideration for their home countries and are even trained to refer to their own nation simply as 'the country I know best'.
Fears are already being expressed that the EU embassies will drain power from Britain's own embassies.
Yet while the new diplomatic corps is getting ready to spend billions representing the EU, it doesn't yet have a budget agreed by the member states whose taxpayers must foot the bill.
Britain's share of the increase – not our share of the budget, our share of the increase – will be £435 million. That's enough to pay for 6,000 NHS doctors, 12,000 nurses, 15,000 police officers or 22,000 Army privates….Go to almost any non-EU nation and you will find an EU embassy towering over the national missions and typically employing three or four times as many staff as any member states.
The EEAS's annual budget is £5.8 billion, more than twice that of our own Foreign and Commonwealth Office. The net salary of the EU's High Representative for Foreign Affairs is more than twice that of the British Foreign Secretary.
These figures don't simply reflect the EU's profligacy; they also reflect a genuine shift in the balance of power….
The idea that Britain needs the EU to represent its interests abroad is asinine.
We are the sixth-largest economy on Earth and the fourth-strongest military power. About 170 independent states manage to conduct effective foreign policies without being members of the EU, many of them a great deal smaller than we are.
Further Reading
Extraordinary Powers Granted to European Police
Members of European Parliament Raise Their Pay
Blog Posts on the European Union
European Union Invokes New Heavens and New Earth
Some of this article will be appearing in the monthly magazine of Christian Voice , a UK ministry whose website is http://www.christianvoice.org.uk/. The article is reprinted here with permission.
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