Franco-Germany Launches Common Parliamentary Assembly with Summit in Paris
The Franco-German assembly was first proposed to celebrate an anniversary of the 1963 post-war reconciliation treaty signed by De Gaulle and Adenauer.
EU heavyweights France and Germany, often referred to as Franco-Germany because of their close alliance, have formally launched a joint parliamentary assembly.
The Franco-German assembly has been established in accordance with the so called Aachen Treaty on Cooperation and Integration, which was signed in January 2019 by French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
It is in effect an update to the 1963 Elysee Treaty on post-World War II reconciliation signed by then French President Charles de Gaulle and then German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer.
The parliamentary assembly of Franco-Germany has 100 members, and will convene biannually to implement the Aachen Treaty and discuss proposals on the relations between the EU’s two largest economies and political heavyweights.
The Franco-German assembly and the Aachen Treaty are also meant to perpetuate the two states’ traditionally massive influence within the European Union.
The joint parliamentary summit in Paris on Monday include 50 members of each of the lower houses of the legislatures of France and Germany, the Assemblée Nationale and the Bundestag.
Every parliamentary group represented in the Bundestag and the Assemblée Nationale has at least one seat in the Franco-Germany assembly, for a total of 14 factions in it, eight French and six German.
The founding act for the assembly was signed by Assemblée Nationale President Richard Ferrand and Bundestag President Wolfgang Schäuble, DW reported.
“[The Franco-German Assembly] underlines our commitment to place bilateral cooperation in a European context,” said Schäuble who is a member of Germany’s ruling conservative CDU party.
“[The assembly] will neither impair nor abolish the sovereignty of either nation,” he emphasized.
“Germany and France have a special responsibility for Europe,” the Bundestag President argued.
On his part, Assemblée Nationale President Richard Ferrand described Monday’s gathering as a “historic day.”
The common parliamentary assembly of Franco-Germany was proposed in January 2018, on the 55th anniversary of the Elysee Treaty signed by French post-war leader De Gaulle and Konrad Adenauer, the first Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany, back then the former West Germany.
While the Franco-German assembly has no budget sovereignty, and cannot make binding decision, it will be monitoring the implementation of the new friendship treaty, and will “make proposals concerning Franco-German relations,” according to its founding document.
Integration of France and Germany’s security and defense policy and the development of a Franco-German economic area are two examples of proposals offered by Schäuble on Monday.
The next sitting of the Franco-German parliamentary assembly will be in Berlin in six months.
(Banner image: Richard Ferrand on Twitter)
