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(Darbą įkėlė Svečias)

Darbas:

configurations:
• General Affairs and External Relations
• Economic and Financial Affairs (ECOFIN)
• Justice and Home Affairs (JHA)
• Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumer Affairs
• Competitiveness2
• Transport, Telecommunications and Energy
• Agriculture and Fisheries
• Environment
• Education, Youth and Culture
Each minister in the Council is empowered3 to commit his or her government. In other words, the minister’s signature is the signature of the whole government. Moreover, each minister in the Council is answerable to his or her national parliament and to the citizens that parliament represents. This ensures the democratic legitimacy4 of the Council’s decisions.
Up to four times a year the presidents and/or prime ministers of the member states, together with the President of the European Commission, meet as the “European Council”. These ‘summit’ meetings set overall EU policy and resolve issues that

could not be settled at a lower level (i.e. by the ministers at normal Council meetings). Given the importance of European Council discussions, they often continue late into the night and attract5 a lot of media attention.

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Environmental1 – aplinkos
Competitive2 - konkuruojantis, rungtyniaujantis; konkurencinis
Empower3 – įgalioti, suteikti teisę
Legitimacy4 – teisėtumas, pagrįstumas
Attract5 – patraukti, pritraukti

The Council has six key responsibilities:
1. To pass European laws – jointly with the European Parliament in many policy areas.
2. To co-ordinate the broad economic policies of the member states.
3. To conclude1 international agreements between the EU and other countries or international organisations.
4. To approve the EU’s budget, jointly with the European Parliament.
5. To develop the EU’s Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP), based on guidelines set by the European Council.
6. To co-ordinate co-operation between the national courts and police forces in criminal matters (see the Freedom, security and justice section).
Most of these responsibilities relate to the ‘Community’ domain3 – i.e. areas of action where the member states have decided to pool their sovereignty and delegate decision-making powers to the EU institutions. This domain is the ‘first pillar’ of the European Union. However, the last two responsibilities relate largely to areas in which the member states have not delegated their powers but are simply working together. This is called ‘intergovernmental co-operation’ and it covers the second and third ‘pillars’ of the European Union.
1. Legislation
Much EU legislation is adopted jointly by the Council and