EUR-Lex Access to European Union law

Back to EUR-Lex homepage

This document is an excerpt from the EUR-Lex website

Civil protection

Civil protection is the protection of people, the environment and property against all kinds of natural and human-induced disasters. Along with the deployment of forces and equipment in response to an emergency, it also involves the planning and preparation for such events. This includes carrying out risk assessments and agreeing on protection and rescue plans and procedures.

European Union (EU) action in the area of civil protection is covered by Article 196 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) and aims to:

  • support and complement EU Member States’ actions at national, regional and local levels in risk prevention, in preparing their civil-protection personnel and in responding to natural and human-induced disasters;
  • promote swift, effective operational cooperation between national civil protection services; and
  • promote consistency in international civil protection work.

Civil protection at the EU level is governed by the secondary legislation, Decision No 1313/2013/EU, forming the Union Civil Protection Mechanism (UCPM). The legal base was recently amended twice in order to strengthen the EU’s collective capacity to prevent, prepare for and respond to disasters, and lately to respond more rapidly and effectively to future crises with cross-border implications, such as the COVID-19 crisis (Decision (EU) 2019/420 and Regulation (EU) 2021/836). The flagship policy of the recent revision of the UCPM is the establishment of rescEU. RescEU is a reserve of additional European response capacities that can be deployed as assistance when Member States are overwhelmed by a disaster.

While EU civil protection cooperation falls under EU internal policies and actions, it has a very important external component: the UCPM may also be activated in case of disasters affecting non-EU countries.

Apart from Member States, the UCPM is open to the participation of non-EU countries: European Free Trade Association countries which are members of the European Economic Area, acceding countries, candidate countries and potential candidates and other European countries. To date, the UCPM has 6 participating states: Iceland, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Norway, Serbia and Turkey.

Under Article 222 of the TFEU (solidarity clause), if a Member State is the object of a terrorist attack or the victim of a natural or human-induced disaster and its authorities request help, the EU must come to its assistance by mobilising all instruments at its disposal. Coordination must be ensured in the Council of the European Union.

SEE ALSO

Top