Brussels - Thirteen EU countries, including Slovenia, have drawn up a non-paper on the outcome of and follow-up to the Conference on the Future of Europe, warning against rash changes to EU treaties. Meanwhile, President Borut Pahor joined calls by French President Emmanuel Macron and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen for such changes.

"The ideas presented by citizens at the conference should speak for themselves and deserve a serious follow-up. They should not be instrumentalised to serve special institutional interests," reads the document published on Twitter by the Danish Permanent Representation to the EU.

The target of the criticism is mainly the European Parliament although it is not specifically mentioned in the document.

The countries say they will study the conference report and the specific proposals carefully and urge each institution to do the same according to ordinary procedures and the agreed rules of the conference.

"We also recall that any decisions will be made within the division of competences established by the treaty and with full respect for key principles such as subsidiarity and proportionality," the countries say in the document, which according to unofficial information, had been initiated by Denmark and Sweden.

"We recall that treaty change has never been a purpose of the conference. What matters is that we address the citizens' ideas and concerns. While we do not exclude any options at this stage, we do not support unconsidered and premature attempts to launch a process towards treaty change.

"This would entail a serious risk of drawing political energy away from the important tasks of finding solutions to the questions to which our citizens expect answers and handling the urgent geopolitical challenges facing Europe."

The countries note that the EU's handling of the crises in recent years - including Covid-19 and Russia's ongoing aggression against Ukraine - "have clearly shown how much the EU can deliver within the current treaty framework".

"The EU has acted quickly to find - and implement - common and effective solutions. We already have a Europe that works. We do not need to rush into institutional reforms in order to deliver results."

Apart from Slovenia, the list of signatories of the document includes Bulgaria, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Croatia, Lithuania, Latvia, Malta, Poland, Romania and Sweden.

Meanwhile, President Borut Pahor expressed support to calls for EU treaty change made by French President Emmanuel Macron, who currently chairs the Council of the EU, and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen at today's concluding event of the Conference on the Future of Europe.

"I support the call on the convention for revision of treaties that the European Parliament calls for. My personal wish is that it would be one of the gradual steps towards the United States of Europe," Pahor said on Twitter, as he retweeted the STA's article about Macron and von der Leyen calling for the convention.

MEPs adopted a resolution calling for changes to EU treaties last Wednesday. The resolution is not binding, while potential changes to the treaties would need to be unanimously endorsed by all 27 members of the EU, with different procedures envisaged for this in each country.

According to EU sources, Slovenia does not oppose the proposed changes to the treaties but is bothered by some other proposals as part of the conference such as the forming of transnational lists at EU elections.

Foreign Ministry State Secretary Gašper Dovžan said after the concluding event that Slovenia was not avoiding responsibility and discussion on possible changes to the EU treaties.

"By joining the non-paper, we only wanted to send a message that all proposals that focus on improving individual policies should be considered. This is the position that Slovenia has advocated all this time," he added.

Slovenia is not opposed to discussing possible changes to the EU treaties, but the past experience teaches us that this needs sincere dialogue, the state secretary noted.

"It is important that discussion involves all member states, because there will be no changes to the fundamental treaties if not all member states and, somewhere also voters, agree with them," Dovžan added.

He said that Slovenia had never rejected the possibility of transition from consensus to qualified majority. "We have, however, always noted that there are also intermediate routes," Dovžan concluded.

The Conference on the Future of Europe was one of the priorities of Slovenia's EU presidency in the second half of last year and as the presiding country Slovenia co-hosted the conference, which concluded today at the European Parliament with a presentation of the proposals gathered during the conference.