High Representative

: Javier Solana is the High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy (Photo: Western European Union)

A high representative is normally someone appointed to represent an organisation abroad.

The former Spanish Foreign Minister and former Secretary General of NATO, Javier Solana, was the Secretary General for the Council and at the same time High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy.

As High Representative he had to assist the Council in Common Foreign and Security Policy. Solana often travelled with the President in office or his foreign minister to negotiate on issues such as peace in the Middle East and elsewhere.

The EU Constitution proposed that the High Representative post should be abolished.

Instead the EU would have a common "Foreign minister". This post should be appointed by the prime ministers in the European Council by super quailified majority, accepted by the President of the EU Commission and be subject to approval together with the rest of the EU Commission by the European Parliament.

The Lisbon Treaty keeps the post but calls it "High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy" rather than Foreign Minister.

The Foreign Minister functions as a vice chair of the EU Commission and a chair of the Foreign Affairs Council (double hated function). Javier Solana has already been appointed for this function but had to leave when it was finally introduced by the delayed Lisbon Treaty.

The British longlife peer, Catherine Ashton, former head of the House of Lords in the United Kingdom has been appointed to the job in a special summit in Brussels, 19 December 2009. She will also be a Vice President in the Commisison.