In June 1998 the heads of government and state of the Member States, who held a meeting in Cardiff, called upon the European Council to elaborate new strategies for the integration of environmental requirements into community policy. Within the scope of the project "Integrating the Environment into EU External Affairs", Ecologic and the IEEP London have drafted a strategy for the General Affairs Council.

At the Cologne European Council the General Affairs Council, composed of the foreign ministers of the Member States, was invited to develop a Cardiff strategy for its field of activity. The European Commission (DG Environement) has assigned to Ecologic and to the IEEP London the task of accompanying the drafting process of this strategy. Because of the broadness of the field of activity of this Council formation it is necessary to devise a strategy which takes into account the integration of environmental issues in international relationships (international relationships, commerce, development, security and defence) as well as horizontal and institutional topics on which the General Affairs Council will be working. This includes the preparation of Intergovernmental Conferences and European Councils and the organization and coordination of Minister Councils in various formations. To support the drafting process of this strategy a seminar has been organized at which environmental officers of the respective Ministries for Foreign Affairs of the Member States and representatives of the DG Environment and the DG External Affairs took part. In the context of this workshop "Integrating Environmental Concerns into the General Affairs Council", examples from Member States and new ideas for the strategy have been discussed.

The results of the workshops have been published in a summary [pdf, 23 kB, English].