What is the Treaty, the themes and priorities
Dialogue between administrations, periodic consultations and identification of a common agenda with major shared themes and priorities to strengthen the bilateral relationship between Rome and Paris. This, says Palazzo Chigi, is the purpose of the Treaty of the Quirinale, the result of a long and complex negotiation commitment, continued throughout 2021, which will be signed today by Prime Minister Mario Draghi and French President Emmanuel Macron.
Cooperation between Italy and France is set within the European reference framework, recalled several times in the text starting from the preamble, with a view to strengthening the EU and its capacity for international action, as well as for the joint promotion of priorities common to two countries.
Among the shared themes are the strengthening of the European Union, the common commitment in the Mediterranean and in Africa, digital and environmental transitions, security, culture and education, economic and industrial cooperation, cooperation in the space sector. , relations between the respective civil societies and cross-border cooperation.
“SHOULDER TENSION, STURDY BASE“- The basis of the Quirinal Treaty” is solid, robust, now Italy and France must show the political will to give it substance and apply it. “On the day of signing the document in 12 chapters plus a ‘feuille de route’, a roadmap with a list of operational initiatives, diplomatic sources claim with Adnkronos the work done in recent months to finalize the bilateral treaty of enhanced cooperation that will frame future relations between Rome and Paris.
The goal, among others, is to create dialogue mechanisms to avoid or contain possible misunderstandings or misunderstandings in the bud, mindful of the tensions of the recent past, which resulted in the diplomatic crisis of 2018. “But this is all behind us and now we have a relationship of an exceptional quality that translates into close proximity between Emmanuel Macron and Mario Draghi, whom I would define as one of trust and mutual respect “, said a source from the Elysée announcing the French president’s visit to Rome. And speaking of “an alignment of the planets” between the two countries.
The negotiation, which in fact only got underway this year, after the slowdown due first to the tensions between the two countries and then to the pandemic, “ran aground” in recent months on some points, informed sources say, but, given the political will to proceed, it was possible to find “adequate formulas acceptable to both”.
Thus, for example, on the political commitment of Rome and Paris to support each other in order to enter the formats from which one of the two countries is excluded, or on the theme of European sovereignty, with the addition of the term “democratic” to give a connotation “less Gaullist “to the wording. And a lot of work has been done to underline how the Sahel and the Mediterranean are of equal priority for both countries.
The sources admit that the text is instead “weak on the industrial side, after all Italy and France are” competitors and their respective divergent national interests. “Better the part on the need to pool European resources for innovation and technological development, to example.
In any case, the Elysée stressed, in a reference to what appeared in our press in recent days, “it is absolutely false that the treaty aims to strengthen France’s predatory attitude on the Italian economy”. Rather “complementarity successes” have been listed, represented by the examples Stellantis and Stmicroelectronics. “What we want to create are not fears, but truly mutually beneficial cooperation”, assure the French sources. An assurance that comes while the Tim-Vivendi hot dossier is on the table, after the offer of the American fund Kkr, which could be addressed in Macron’s Roman talks.
“As for the comparison with the Elysée Treaty between France and Germany of 1963 and the updated Aachen Treaty of 2019, the differences by Rome and Paris are deliberately underlined.” It is useless to pursue history “, says an Italian source, referring to the Franco-German agreement, rather urging “to put in place” a Treaty also between Rome and Berlin. Which, as underlined by the president of ISPI Giampiero Massolo, would complete that Italy-France-Germany triangle on which to build a European Union “stronger”. The Elysée Treaty was “a treaty for reconciliation, we must not reconcile with Italy, which is a neighbor, a partner, with whom we have a common heritage”, observes a source of the French presidency, clarifying among other things that “we have not played with the triangle of jealousy in France’s relations with its partners”.
Tomorrow’s signature of the Treaty, “an absolute first for Italy, which has rediscovered ambition and initiative in Europe”, commented again by the Elysée, can also be read as “a victory over Italian nationalists who have a Risorgimento vision of the relationship with France “, comments Jean Pierre Darnis, professor of Franco-Italian relations at the Cote d’Azur University of Nice and of contemporary history at Luiss. “Given the premises – he says in a reference to the ‘brakes’ put in the course of the work on the text by various ‘anti-French’ circles – one could fear that it was only a symbolic document. And instead it is an ambitious text, it defines a road map on various French and Italian sectoral policies “.
It is a “historic” treaty, echoes Sandro Gozi, MEP of Renew Europe, which is being signed in a phase in which “the interests of the two countries have never been so convergent”. And that will make the difference in relations between Rome and Paris, but also in Europe. Launched at the bilateral summit in September 2017, while the Libyan and Stx-Fincantieri dossiers stirred relations between the two countries, the Treaty aims to strengthen cooperation in the field of foreign policy, European affairs, defense and security. the creation of a Franco-Italian Youth Council, an economic ministerial forum, a cross-border cooperation committee as well as mobility programs for artists and the Franco-Italian civic service already announced during Mattarella’s state visit to Paris in July.
Source-www.adnkronos.com