Page 123 - SEVEN STEPS for COMPREHENDING the EUROPEAN UNION

122 / SEVEN STEPS FOR COMPREHENDING THE EUROPEAN UNION

such as approval of the President of the European Council, appointment
of the President of the EU Commission, appointment of the High
Representative for the EU Common Foreign and Security Policy, etc.

It is also interesting that the EU Amsterdam Agreement of 1997
introduced a new rule of “constructive/positive abstention” which
can be applied when a decision has to be taken by the Unanimity
st
voting rule. The 31 chapter of the Treaty on the EU allows member
states to abstain and, thus, break the consensus without blocking the
decision. In such a case, the member state which abstained has no
obligation towards the decision nor may it take any steps against the
implementation of the decision. Before 2022, open sources offered only
a few instances when the constructive abstention rule was applied: in
2008, the rule was used by Cyprus at the voting for the EU Rule of Law
mission to Kosovo. Since the beginning of the Russian war on Ukraine,
Hungary used the constructive abstention tool on numerous occasions,
mainly when voting on EU military and financial assistance to Ukraine.