Origins and development of the E3
The E3 format emerged in 2003 as a joint initiative of France, Germany and the UK to negotiate with Iran over its nuclear reprocessing and enrichment activities. In October 2003, the E3 foreign ministers visited Tehran seeking to avert the risk of US military action, following the invasion of Iraq, and to address the international community’s concerns regarding Iran’s nuclear programme. For more than a decade, the E3 has remained central to the diplomatic process that resulted in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in July 2015.1
The E3 format has evolved to reflect the fluctuations of diplomacy with Iran. The inclusion in late 2004 of Common Foreign and Security Policy High Representative Javier Solana, as the EU’s point of contact for Iran, created the E3+EU format. This connected the E3 directly with the EU foreign and security policymaking machinery, and helped address fears that the process was bypassing the EU, while maintaining the flexibility and responsiveness of the intergovernmental format. In January 2006, China, Russia and the US joined the negotiations with Iran. This brought the other permanent members of the UN Security Council (UNSC) into a collective approach consisting of UN-mandated sanctions alongside diplomacy (also known as the P5+1 or E3+3). The EU continued to play a coordinating role in the process, frequently acting as chair or co-chair of talks with Iran, through consecutive high representatives for foreign affairs and security policy (HR/VPs)2 Catherine Ashton and Federica Mogherini.
The Trump administration’s hostility to the JCPOA, and subsequent withdrawal in 2018, posed a significant challenge to the E3. Despite this, the grouping has maintained its cohesiveness, which is rooted in a shared commitment to finding a diplomatic resolution to the challenge of Iran’s nuclear programme. E3+EU efforts have focused on ensuring that Iran remains in compliance with the terms of the JCPOA, developing measures to mitigate the effects of re-imposed US sanctions on European trade with Iran, and seeking to re-engage the Trump administration in a diplomatic process with Tehran. The transatlantic division on Iran policy has reinforced the shared interests and perspectives of the E3 while straining their relations with the US.
Beyond the Iran nuclear issue, diplomatic coordination in the E3 format has broadened to encompass other international matters such as the conflict in Syria, the 2019 attack on oil facilities in Saudi Arabia and freedom of navigation in the South China Sea.3 E3 collaboration has generally been ad hoc and reactive to international security developments, building on informal and habitual contacts at the official level, and primarily focused on issues where it has been slow or difficult to establish a common EU position (such as regarding events in the Golan Heights) or where there has been a gap between European and US positions (such as on Syria or the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi).4 Germany’s recent term as a non-permanent member of the UNSC facilitated additional cooperation beyond the E3, sometimes leading to statements that were co-signed by other European non-permanent UNSC members such as Belgium and Poland.5 There have been regular meetings of E3 foreign ministers, generally rooted in the JCPOA process but often covering other related issues, including on the margins of international gatherings such as the UN General Assembly. There has also been an E3–Turkey dialogue conducted at the head-of-government level.6
Strengths and weaknesses of the format
The main test of the E3 so far has been nuclear diplomacy with Iran but the strengths and weaknesses of the format for diplomatic cooperation have become apparent as its scope has broadened. Its key strengths include:
- Effective policy coordination between Europe’s three leading diplomatic powers – providing them with a collective weight and credibility that they do not possess individually.
- Efficient consensus-building, in particular through the E3+EU, by which an agreed policy among the smaller group could form the basis of EU consensus.
- Managing transatlantic differences, helping form collective European positions and insulating individual states from excessive US pressure.
- Bridge-building capability, with the E3 providing a credible but distinctive alternative diplomatic interlocutor for Iran. The E3 could perform a bridging function that would have been impossible in an exclusive US–Iran process.
- Light-touch institutionalization, the speed and simplicity of the format offers a straightforward and flexible way of agreeing common positions compared to more institutionalized options.
At the same time, the format has shown the following limitations:
- Issue-specific origins: The creation of the E3 was issue- and circumstance-specific, and it may be difficult to replicate the degree of strategic alignment achieved in regard to Iran. This potentially reduces the scope for E3 cooperation to broad statements or calls for respect of international law.
- Resistance from within the EU: Cooperation among the E3 has attracted criticism from other member states, based on the perception that it bypasses the EU’s collective processes.7 Italy, which had long felt frustrated at being excluded from the E3 process with Iran, was included in a new initiative in January 2018 to engage Iran on issues not covered by the JCPOA. Soon after, other large member states, in particular Spain, expressed strong reservations, which resulted in it blocking texts at Council level based solely on objections to the process.8 Although mitigated somewhat by the role of the HR/VP in the Iran negotiations, these concerns remain and may be exacerbated by the UK’s position outside of the EU.
- Impact: E3 decisions do not have the same weight as EU decisions. If, especially now that the UK has left the union, the E3 does not find a way to link its statements to wider EU policy, its impact is likely to be reduced.
Overall, the E3 has developed into a well-established ad hoc coordination mechanism for France, Germany and the UK, and sometimes the HR/VP, to react jointly to a wider range of international security developments.
1 For a comprehensive account of the European diplomatic dialogue with Iran, see Adebahr, C. (2017), Europe and Iran: The Nuclear Deal and Beyond, Routledge.
2 HR/VP is the common way to shorten the job title EU High Representative for Foreign Policy and Vice President of the European Commission.
3 UK government (2011), ‘UK, Germany and France call for President Assad to stand down’, news story, https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-germany-and-france-call-for-president-assad-to-stand-down; UK government (2019), ‘Joint statement by the heads of state and government of France, Germany and the United Kingdom’, news story, https://www.gov.uk/government/news/joint-statement-by-the-heads-of-state-and-government-of-france-germany-and-the-united-kingdom; UK government (2019), ‘E3 joint statement on the situation in the South China Sea’, press release, https://www.gov.uk/government/news/e3-joint-statement-on-the-situation-in-the-south-china-sea.
4 UK government (2018), ‘Jamal Khashoggi’s death: joint statement by UK, France and Germany foreign ministers’, press release,
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/joint-uk-france-and-germany-statement-on-jamal-khashoggis-death.
5 French embassy in Warsaw (2019), ‘Golan Heights: Joint statement by Belgium, France, Germany, Poland and the UK’, 26 March 2019, news, https://pl.ambafrance.org/Golan-Heights-Joint-statement-by-Belgium-France-Germany-Poland-and-the-UK-26-9060.
6 Reuters (2019), ‘UK, France, Germany, Turkey say attacks on civilians in Syria must end’, 3 December 2019, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-syria-nato/uk-france-germany-turkey-say-attacks-on-civilians-in-syria-must-end-idUSKBN1Y72DE.
7 Brattberg, E. (2020), ‘The E3, the EU, and the Post-Brexit Diplomatic Landscape’, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 18 June 2020, https://carnegieendowment.org/2020/06/18/e3-eu-and-post-brexit-diplomatic-landscape-pub-82095.
8 Herszenhorn, D. (2019), ‘EU’s Iran fight is not about Iran (or Trump)’, Politico, 30 January 2019, https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-iran-fight-diplomacy-nuclear-deal.