Former Labour PM, President emeritus want Malta out of NATO PfP

The former prime minister who made Malta’s withdrawal from NATO’s Partnership for Peace one of his first acts of office in 1996, has joined an open letter call to Robert Abela not to extend Malta’s membership.

Labour MEP Alfred Sant, as well as President Emeritus Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca, signed the open letter to Abela urging Malta’s withdrawal from the NATO programme.

Other signatories include dockyards trade unionist Sammy Meilaq, members of Moviment Graffitti, academics Peter Mayo and dean of the Faculty of Education Colin Calleja, as well as Yana Mintoff Bland, daughter of erstwhile prime minister Dom Mintoff who in 1971 closed NATO bases in Malta.

“We believe Malta’s neutrality is the best means for safeguarding peace in our country, our region, and the world. Malta should not engage in any agreement or pact that endangers and threatens the well-being of our children and youth with the joy of peace.

“Our country’s neutrality does not imply that we isolate ourselves from the suffering of others. Neutrality means showing solidarity without creating further conflict through the use of violence, warfare, and all types of armaments, including nuclear ones.”

The Labour government is proposing reaffirming the PfP agreement it had staunchly opposed in 1995.

Foreign minister Ian Borg told the parliamemtary foreign affairs committee that a new dimension exists for Malta to have its PfP membership retained, saying it fully conforms to Malta’s limitations in terms of its constitutional neutrality.

The 2012 PfP saga

Malta rejoined the PfP in 2008 right after the Nationalist Party reclaimed power in the general elections.

The US embassy cables leaked by Wikileaks in 2011 had revealed the key role played by permanent representative to the EU Richard Cachia Caruana, who had been complaining of Malta’s inability to attend EU defence meetings where NATO classified information is discussed.

The Maltese government faced a major hurdle due to popular sentiment being split right down the partisan divide due to Labour’s opposition to the PfP –  then unchanged since 1996.

Cachia Caruana’s inventive solution was for Malta to declare it had “simply ceased active participation” in PfP – but not that it had formally withdrawn from the agreements as Sant had indeed done in 1996.

American diplomats dubbed it a “procedural band aid” to allow Malta to bypass the need for House ratification.

By arguing that the prior PfP agreement had always ‘remained in force’, Cachia Caruana was proposing something in direct contrast to Labour’s “unconditional withdrawal” as stated in the government’s letter to NATO.

After 2008, Labour complained that the PN government had circumvented Malta’s Treaties Act, because joining PfP required a parliamentary resolution.

It was years later when the Wikileaks cables were leaked in 2011, that Labour took the fight to the parliamentary foreign affairs committee, grilling Cachia Caruana on his role in reactivating the PfP membership. It led to a motion of censure that was supported by rebel MP Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando, leading to the forced resignation of Cachia Caruana.