The Treaty establishing the EAEC

The Treaty establishing the EAEC


The Treaty establishing Euratom, with its 225 articles and five annexes, provided for the same institutional pattern as both the other treaties, with an Assembly, a Council, a Commission and a Court of Justice. The Assembly and an Economic and Social Committee (ESC) were to be shared institutions of the EEC and Euratom.


Euratom’s mission was to contribute to the rapid formation and development of Europe’s nuclear industries, to help improve the standard of living in the Member States and to further the development of trade with other countries. Its responsibilities were strictly limited to civil applications of nuclear energy. The Euratom Treaty also created the framework for a nuclear common market.



Compared with the progress being made on the common market front, progress with the European Atomic Energy Community (EAEC or Euratom) was slow, not least because of a failure to reach agreement on a number of important issues, for example the construction of a European isotope-separation plant. Euratom thus lost some of its importance. Nevertheless, Euratom’s fundamental objectives were to foster research into and utilisation of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, and to encourage the development of relations with other countries.

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