The meeting is being held at the Higher College of National Defence Studies (Spanish acronym: CESEDEN) and is being attended by the Chiefs of Defence Staff (CDS) and Director-Generals for Foreign Policy of the countries that make up this army corps (the framework nations). The meeting is being chaired by the Spanish CDS, Admiral General Fernando García Sánchez, and the Spanish Director-General for Foreign Policy and Multilateral, Global and Security Affairs, Santiago Cabanas Ansorena.
Over the course of the various working sessions, the Common Committee will review the activities carried out by Eurocorps in 2012, which include the deployment of its general headquarters in Afghanistan where it took over responsibility for the general headquarters of ISAF (International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan) and sends a contingent every six months. Eurocorps fulfilled the same mission between August 2004 and March 2005.
The Common Committee will debate and approve the Eurocorps budget and the framework mandate for action that will be handed down to its Chief of Staff for 2013. Furthermore, it will continue to monitor Poland's integration process as a new framework nation within Eurocorps. Next year, Poland will increase its presence at the general headquarters in Strasbourg and become a full integrated member in 2016.
The Eurocorps is a European multinational army corps that was set up in 1993 around the Franco-German Brigade and later joined by Belgium, Luxembourg and Spain. It was declared available to NATO and the European Union in 1994 and certified as operational as a NATO Rapid Reaction Force in 2002. Under the Strasbourg Treaty of 2004, the framework nations granted the corps a statute of operational autonomy under supervision by the Common Committee. Poland was officially admitted as a new framework nation in 2011 and is currently undergoing a process of integration.