The Minister for Defence, Mr O'Dea, said last night he would be seeking clarification from EU officials today on whether Irish troops participating in the proposed EU rapid response force, the so-called battle groups, would potentially be expected to engage in "high-intensity combat".
The issue will be among a number of potential difficulties in Irish participation in the EU battle group proposals, which the Minister will be raising at a meeting of European defence ministers in Brussels today.
Last week the Cabinet approved a decision to allow Mr O'Dea to engage in consultations with EU partners on the possibility of Irish participation in the EU rapid-response battle groups. The Minister said that he would go back to Cabinet with the outcome of the discussions and that no final decision had been taken.
Mr O'Dea told The Irish Times that one of the issues that had caught his eye in briefing material was documentation that spoke of engagement in "high-intensity combat".
He said that he would be seeking clarification from EU officials about whether they envisaged that the role of the battle groups would go beyond the "Petersberg tasks" - traditional peacekeeping, humanitarian assistance, peace support or conflict prevention operations such as peacemaking - which the Government has already accepted in previous agreements.
The Minister said that he would be seeking details as to what was meant by "high-intensity combat".
The Minister said he would also be raising the possibility that the requirement that the battle groups would deploy to trouble spots within a five- to 10-day period could conflict with the Government's "triple lock" policy for involvement. This would require that every operation would have to be approved by the Dáil, the Cabinet and the UN Security Council.
He said the Government was not prepared to change the triple-lock requirement in any way.
Mr O'Dea said that, as Ireland would only be committing around 850 soldiers, that participation in battle groups would involve co-operation with other countries.
He said he believed this would involve some form of joint training and he had been informed there could be legal difficulties about Irish troops "under arms" travelling abroad to engage in exercises or of military forces from other nations coming here.
The Minister said that there was also the issue of which countries Ireland would co-operate with in any such battle groups. He said there had been some speculation that Ireland could participate in a battle group with neutral or non-aligned countries such as Sweden or Finland. However, he said there was now some suggestion that these countries may link up with Norway, which is not a member of the EU and is a member of NATO.
He said that whether Ireland could participate in a battle group with a NATO member would be something that he would have to bring to Cabinet.
Mr O'Dea said he had been advised there would be no requirement for additional equipment for the Army to allow it to participate in the proposed battle groups.
He said the issue of the cost of involvement in the battle group proposals had not been decided.
