"With respect to military capacity, we and the generality of European nations are in favour of complementarity and not duplication of means with NATO," he told the Lusa news agency.

Portas was reacting to call issued earlier on Tuesday by France, Germany, Belgium and Luxembourg for the creation by 2004 of a new European headquarters to command military operations independent of NATO.

The four countries, who all fiercely opposed the US-led war on Iraq, also called for an acceleration of EU defence cooperation at the end of their one-day defence summit held in Brussels.

The summit sparked controversy for excluding EU member states which supported the war, including those like Britain which have strong militaries.

SPACE.WIRE