ACP–EU development cooperation and which reflects the comparative interests of individual Member States. Beginning in 1957 (Rome Treaty) a group of 6 nations in Western Europe, France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxembourg, created the European Economic Community (EEC). These member states were gradually joined by others through various waves of enlargement and became the European Union. Similarly to European expansion, at the time of the Treaty of Rome, there were a limited number of nations involved. Beginning with 18 countries and territories that had special relations with the member states, the so-called Associated States gained membership, eventually establishing the group known
Three pillars of the European Union Euratom) whose organisational structure had already been unified in 1965-67, through the Merger Treaty. Later, through the Treaty of Maastricht the word "Economic" was removed from the EEC, so it became simply the EC. Then with the Treaty of Amsterdam additional areas would be transferred from the third pillar to the first. In 2002, the ECSC (which had a lifetime of 50 years) ceased to exist because the treaty which established it, the Treaty of Paris, had expired. In the CFSP and PJCCM pillars the powers of the European Parliament, the Commission and European Court of Justice with respect to