The Presidency of European Union (EU) plays an important role in the functioning of the whole organisation. First of all, it is the propelling force for new decisions and policies in every area. Interior and exterior security of the EU (especially terrorism and its prevention) has become major issues in recent years. Terrorist attacks in London and Madrid not only made us realise that interior security was threatened, but also that this problem is connected to the exterior environment. In eff ect, many documents referring to fi ghting terrorism have come into existence. It have shown a big demand for creating instruments that would deal with security issues. Moreover, many of the Union’s institutions have been granted rights to combat it. That is why it is legitimate to look closer at the output of previous Presidencies in the area of freedom, security, and justice. This paper aims at listing matters connected to the EU’s security through the analysis of priorities and conclusions of the Presidencies in years 2005–2010, and the effects coming from Work Programmes’ guidelines with simultaneous pointing to often different goals set by particular countries.

A very important element of the structural and substantive functioning of the Council of the European Union is a cyclic Presidency (leadership) held for a period of six months by each Member State in turn in the system of the intergovernmental councils (the Council of the European Union and the European Council). The author of the present article would like to focus on the first two presidencies of the unifi ed Germany. Both took place in the 1990s – in the first decade of the country’s functioning after reunification. They also exemplify the ‘new’ Germany’s approach to the European integration, its deepening and widening. Germany wanted to dispel the doubts of the other EU Member States whether, as the united country, it would still support the process of integration. The 21st century proved the fears pointless.