The 11th COSAC in Bonn on 24-25 October 1994 focused on three main topics: internal security of the EU, environmental protection and the application of the principle of subsidiarity. Internal security and police cooperation had become topical with the Maastricht Treaty, which provided for intergovernmental co-operation in this field. The German Presidency focused discussion on the newly-created Europol, examining its powers and how national parliaments could scrutinise its activities, although the debate also touched upon the problem of asylum, its definition, the procedure for managing asylum claims and the application of the Dublin Convention.
The German federal minister for the environment, Mr Klaus Töpfer, addressed the meeting on environmental issues. The Minister recalled the importance of the Conference in Rio de Janeiro that had sought to agree ways to reduce green house gases. The German Bundeskanzler, Mr Helmut Kohl, made a speech on European integration that underlined the importance of national parliaments in the integration process and pleaded for the participation of parliaments in the preparatory works to the IGC in 1996.
The final debate was on the application of the subsidiarity principle, which had been enshrined in the Maastricht Treaty in Article 3B and fleshed out in declarations from the European Council in Birmingham and Edinburgh in autumn 1992.