Capacity building in the EU’s missions and operations

While the EU’s peace and security assistance comes in different forms – including EU budgetary support for security sector reform with a primarily civilian objective and EU advice and training for the security actors of partner countries and organisations (including military organisations) under the CSDP – the existing framework excludes use of the EU budget to finance activities aimed at enhanced cooperation with third country defence sectors and armed forces. The joint communication of 28 April 2015 from the European Commission and the EU’s High Representative for Foreign and Security Policy (HR/VP) on capacity building in support of security and development (CBSD) concluded that the absence of such systematic and longer-term EU support for defence and military security sector capacity building has negatively affected the overall effectiveness of EU support and continues to hamper the EU’s ability to deal comprehensively with the deteriorating security environment. Consequently, the Commission’s 2016 Work Programme includes a package on capacity building in the security sector and a proposal for the amendment of Regulation 230/2014 in order to do more to reflect the key role that the military can play in creating an enabling environment for sustainable development and in ensuring human security.