European Union

The partnership between the two international bodies goes back to the beginning of the Helsinki process in the early 1970s, when the then-European Communities (predecessors of today’s European Union) played an active role in negotiating the Helsinki Final Act. The Act was signed by then-Prime Minister of Italy Aldo Moro, in his capacity as President of the Council of the European Communities. Presidents of the Commission of the European Union signed the 1990 Charter of Paris for a New Europe and the 1999 Charter for European Security, alongside the EU Presidency, and delivered a supportive interpretative statement to the OSCE’s 2010 Astana Commemorative Declaration Towards a Security Community. In 2006, the EU’s participation in the OSCE at the meetings of the Organization’s decision-making bodies was formalized in the OSCE’s Rules of Procedure, which granted it a seat next to (and the right to deliver statements right after) the participating State holding the rotating EU Presidency. 

All 27 EU Member States are participating States of the OSCE, together accounting for 47 per cent of the Organization’s total.

Over the years, the scope of co-operation between the OSCE and the EU broadened and deepened. Relations have increased at all levels in particular since a key Exchange of Letters took place in 2018 between the Secretary Generals of the OSCE, the European External Action Service and the EU Commission, which called for an annual meeting focused on ways to maximize efficient and effective co-operation between the three, as well as regular discussions and exchanges of information at headquarters and field operations level. Several focus areas for these discussions were outlined in the Letter, including conflict prevention and mediation, human rights and fundamental freedoms, the protection of national minorities, gender equality, the promotion of the rule of law and of civilian security, the strengthening of the participating States’ resilience by responding to transnational threats, politico-military aspects of security, and confidence and security-building measures in the economic and environmental sphere.

The EU is represented at the OSCE by its Delegation of the European Union to the International Organisations in Vienna, whose Deputy Head is the Ambassador/Permanent Representative to the OSCE.

The OSCE maintains strong co-operative relations primarily with the EU Delegation in Vienna and the European External Action Service, but also with key line services of the European Commission, including the Directorate-General for Enlargement and the Eastern Neighbourhood (DG ENEST), the Service for Foreign Policy Instruments (FPI), the Directorate-General for Migration and Home Affairs (DG HOME) and the Directorate-General for International Partnerships (DG INTPA).