Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-03-29-Speech-3-106"
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"en.20000329.7.3-106"2
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"Mr President, the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership launched in 1995 has broken down. It is official. The relaunch of this policy announced by the forthcoming French presidency of the European Union bodes well, since the countries in this region have to face extensive and urgent challenges. In order to respond effectively to these, it is crucial that the interests of the peoples around this central sea are truly taken into consideration, and that the people participate actively in the partnership. Let me say from the outset that the time has come to change the course of Euro-Mediterranean policy.
First of all, the objective of a policy of this type must be to tackle the blatant disparities between the northern and southern shores of the Mediterranean, which keep the peoples of the south in an explosive economic and social situation. Poverty, a high level of illiteracy, massive unemployment, particularly among young people, extreme inequalities and an increasing technological deficit compared to Western countries. There are considerable infrastructure needs, not to mention environmental challenges.
The effect of this widening gap can only be to increasingly foster the most violent forms of nationalism, fundamentalism and war. Indeed, the weight of foreign debt, the drop in the prices of raw materials and structural adjustment plans have already forced these countries to adopt swingeing austerity programmes and have wrecked their capacity for development. The prospect of a free trade area, a sort of regional MAI, is liable to dangerously exacerbate these power struggles. Studies show that two thirds of Tunisian industry would not survive the opening of frontiers.
The slowdown in the process indeed stems as much from the deadlock in the Near-East peace process as from the many concerns expressed increasingly overtly: for instance, the first Euro-Mediterranean trade union conference held a year ago which highlighted the complete absence of the social dimension. There are, however, advantages to establishing things from scratch. Citizens, NGOs and trade unions are committed on a day-to-day basis to supporting solidarity between peoples and to putting many local cooperation projects into practice. The Euro-Mediterranean process thus calls for a pooling of resources which should be advantageous to all concerned in moving towards a common area of prosperity, which was the objective set in Barcelona.
There are many possible ways out of the dogma of free trade that was challenged in Seattle. It is more than time to wipe out the debt of the countries of the South, and to engage in technology transfer and cooperation in the areas of training between public services.
I should finally like to say that, besides working towards peace in the Middle East, which the European Union must continue to strive for, I am just as keen to seeing Europe play a much more active part in ensuring that the referendum on self-determination in the Western Sahara, which is under serious threat, is held in the conditions stipulated under UN authority. The credibility of European foreign policy is at stake here."@en1
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