Area of Justice, Freedom and Security

Post Tampere Programme Perspectives - The Hague Programme

The establishment of an Area of Freedom, Security and Justice was a new goal set for the EU by the Treaty of Amsterdam. The Tampere European Council (October 1999) set a very ambitious programme as regards this goal with policy guidelines and objectives as well as a timetable for their attainment. In view of the fact that on 1 May 2004, with the full accession of the ten new Member States, the Tampere programme completed 5 years, the Irish and Dutch Presidencies have elaborated new directions for enhancing "meta -post Tampere" co-operation in the JHA field.

The European Commission published a Communication on 2 June 2004 in which it makes an (positive) assessment of the EU action regarding the implementation of measures provided for by the Tampere programme. It also sets future guidelines for the upcoming programme in the JHA domain in connection to the measures that have to be taken for the next years. In this regard, the Commission has opened a public consultation process which ended on 31 August 2004.