Relations with the US and China, climate change, poverty eradication, crisis management and counter-terrorism are to be the top priorities of the EU’s new diplomatic corps, EU foreign relations chief Catherine Ashton told her stable of 136 ambassadors at a behind-closed-doors meeting in Brussels on Wednesday (1 December).

The speech, given at a regular annual gathering of EU envoys in the European Commission headquarters, doubled as a low-key launch ceremony for the European External Action Service (EEAS), which formally began life the same day.

A source familiar with the discussions at the event told EUobsever: “She surprised everyone with a very touching presentation about her personal journey over the past 10 months. She spoke without notes and she showed pictures of herself embracing a child in Haiti, of rural poverty in China.”

“She went straight to the key issues: How we can ensure that the EU 28 [the 27 member states and the EEAS] can send out one message; the challenges we face from climate change; improving the relationship with the US, which is for her clearly the EU’s most important relationship; then strategic partners, especially China, how important it is to try to shape one EU agenda on China.”

“There was also a wake up call on resources – that we have to do more with less. That we live in extraordinary times and the EEAS cannot be a stranger to financial difficulties.”

The contact said that there was no official mention of the WikiLeaks affair but the issue did come up in the Ashton question-and-answer session: “She noted that the cables show how the US is actually working in partnership with other countries, how they prove the conspiracy theorists wrong.”

Another source who was present at the event said: “Gender balance came up. Given that it was a room dominated by men, they were happy that Cathy was starting to improve things in this area.”