Five countries establish a European paramilitary police force: On 17 September 2004, the establishment of a European Gendarmerie Force (EGF) by five EU member states (France, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal and Spain) under a French proposal from 2003 was agreed in the Dutch town of Noordwick, with the signing of an agreement by the five countries' defence ministers.
The agreement will result in the creation of a permanent joint paramilitary police unit to be used for public order and backing up the military. The EGF headquarters will become operative next year in the north-eastern Italian town of Vicenza, and it will be the European gendarmerie's only permanent structure. It will initially be formed by 800 men (backed by 2,300 in reserve reserves), drawn from the countries' paramilitary police: the Gendarmerie National in France, the Arma dei Carabinieri in Italy, the Koninklijke Marechaussée in Holland, the Guarda Nacional Republicana in Portugal and the Guardia Civil in Spain. [...]
The agreement is open to other EU states, but the establishment of a five-country initiative shows the absence of an EU-wide consensus
