After Green EU parliament member Francisco Guerreiro called for a coordinated reporting procedure and investigations of unidentified anomalous objects in airspace (UAP/formerly UFOs) across Europe, the politician has now formally submitted a resolution proposal for the civil reporting, collection, and evaluation of UAP sightings.
The Portuguese representative has consistently advocated for a new, equally serious as well as scientific approach to the issue of unidentified flying objects in the context of flight safety and scientific interest in these phenomena through parliamentary engagement. Most recently in a speech during Plenary Session on February 5, 2024, where Guerreiro called for what he has now formally submitted.
Under file reference "B9-0194/2024" of the European Parliament, the resolution submitted by Guerreiro on March 11 reads as follows:
MOTION FOR A RESOLUTION
pursuant to Rule 143 of the Rules of Procedure on updating the EU Regulation on the reporting, analysis and follow-up of occurrences in civil aviation to include UAP reporting
Francisco Guerreiro
B9-0194/2024
Motion for a European Parliament resolution on updating the EU Regulation on the reporting, analysis and follow-up of occurrences in civil aviation to include UAP reporting
The European Parliament, having regard to Rule 143 of its Rules of Procedure
1. whereas unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAPs) remain a stigmatised subject,which often inhibits methodical data collection and analysis by the scientific community;
2. whereas a significant number of UAP occurrences, including many first-hand sightings by airline pilots and their crews, remain unexplained or unreported;
3. whereas Regulation (EU) 376/20141 only allows aviation professionals to report on safety-related matters;
4. whereas bipartisan lawmakers in the United States have proposed new legislation (Bill HR6967, the Safe Airspace for Americans Act) to protect civilian pilots and aviation personnel who report UAP sightings;
A. Considers that the EU should propose guidelines for a common methodology for reporting and analysing UAP sightings, which could result in a harmonised EU database and repository and thus allow a technical exchange of information between Member States;
B. Calls on the Commission to propose updating the current legislation, namely Regulation (EU) 376/2014, to include a mechanism for consistent, transparent and stigma-free reporting and data analysis regarding UAPs in EU airspace, including where such occurrences do not pose any apparent and immediate safety risk to the aircraft concerned.
When and if a debate or even a vote on this matter can be expected is currently not known.
EU-MP Francisco Guerreiro
Copyright: Green European Foundation & Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung European Union (viaWikimedaCommons) / CC BY-SA 4.0
Background: Handling of UFOs & UAP in Europe - A short summary
- Since the wave of sightings of mostly triangular unidentified flying objects (UFOs) in BELGIUM from autumn 1989 to May 1990, the Belgian Air Force cooperated with the civilian Belgian UFO research organization SOBEPS (now COBEPS) even publicly acknowledged by Air Force Chief of Staff Major General Wilfried De Brouwer, who supported this research. After thorough investigations of the incidents, it was concluded that some of the reported and partially documented events could not be explained rationally. The findings of the investigation were then published in a 700-page final report in book form. The "UFO wave over Belgium" has since been regarded as a standard work of scientific UFO research and cooperation between civilian and military UFO investigators. COBEPS continues to investigate UFO incidents in Belgium to this day, sometimes with the support of authorities and the military. Web.
- In DENMARK, in 2009, the Air Force released 300 pages of previously classified UFO files from the years 1978 to 2002 and declared that future reports would be jointly handled with the civilian Danish UFO research organization SUFOI. The Danish Army (Forcvaret) has an online “UFO-Arkiv”.
While there never was an official UFO-Investigation Office in GERMANY, several official files by German ministeries, departments and authorities were published via the German National Archive (Bundesarchiv). The book “Deutschlands UFO-Akten” compiles all so far known and available German UFO-files on 450 pages. There were also two essays compiled by the “Wissenschaftliche Dienste des Deutschen Bundestages” (WD, Scientific Services by German Parliament) on the political handling and further questions of UFOs and SETI in Germany and within the EU.
- In FINLAND, the military also released 300 UFO files from the years 1933 to 1979 in 2009. The handling of the files since then is (at least to this author) unclear.
- In FRANCE, there is even a predominantly state-owned UFO research institution to this day, headed by the military-civilian space agency CNES. Since 2007, the "Groupe d'Études et d'Informations sur les Phénomènes Aérospatiaux Non Identifiés (GEIPAN)" has published, investigated, and evaluated over 2.500 UFO-sightings in France. The French UFO authority concludes that 3,3 percent of the sightings cannot be identified. Web.
- Even in the UNITED KINGDOM, there was an official "UFO Office" of the Ministry of Defence (MoD) until 2009. When the office closed in December 2009, an MoD spokesperson stated that they no longer saw any benefit in investigating UFO reports. According to official information, the UFO-Office was primarily used to investigate possible threats to British territories by unidentified flying objects (UFOs) and not to study their alleged extraterrestrial origin. The released British UFO-files can be accessed online.
- IRELAND: For 37 years, the Irish Army also secretly researched UFO phenomena over the island state from 1947 and documented each case in detail. The documents became known in 2007 through the "Freedom of Information Act" for the publication of previously secret government documents.
- In ITALY, since 1978, the "General Security Division" of the Italian Air Force has been responsible for documenting and investigating UFO sightings, gradually releasing their reports online.
- SWEDEN: As early as 1987, the Swedish military made its UFO research public and transferred the previously unclassified part of its files to the archive of the civilian UFO research organization UFO-Svenska. Since then, the Swedish military has continuously entered new UFO sightings into the database. In the spring of 2016, the Swedish UFO researchers working with the military, led by Clas Svahn, published thousands of previously unpublished files from the Swedish military archive of the Swedish Defence Research Agency (FOI) on the so-called "Ghost Rockets”.
- In SPAIN, between 1992-1999, more than 80 files with over 1000 pages on civilian and military UFO sightings were also published and have been accessible and downloadable via the website of the Spanish Ministry of Defence since then.
