Posted on 24 January 2014
The archives service of the European Commission has transferred 655 archival records to the Historical Archives of the European Union in Florence which are now open to the public. An inventory for these files has been drawn up and is now available online on the website of the Historical Archives.
The archival fonds of the European Commission at the Historical Archives of the EU comprises a total of 52856 paper files. 26.324 files concern the High Authority of the European Coal and Steel Community and 26.532 files relate to the Commissions of the European Economic Community and the European Atomic Energy Community. These files have been transferred along with copies on microfiche from Brussels on an annual basis since 1986. The files can be consulted on site at the Historical Archives in accordance to the access rules to archival records of the European Union which foresees a closure of 30 years for internal records of EU Institutions.
The 655 files transferred in 2013 and now open for consultation cover three decades from the 1950s to the early 1980s. The files deal with the financial resources and priority areas of interventions for regional policies of the European Communities and its international development cooperation. The files also shed light on the Communities’ industrial reconversion of nuclear reactors and new horizons for energy policy. The files also contain a complete series of minutes of the Commission’s meetings, full agenda meetings and meetings restricted to the Commission during 1982.
The Commission of the European Union acts as executive branch of the EU institutions and exists in its current form since 1967 when the executives of the European Community for Coal and Steel, the European Economic Community and the European Atomic Energy Community were merged. The Commission is based in Brussels and its current President is the Portuguese national, José Manuel Barroso.
European Commission Fonds at HAEU