Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-04-11-Speech-2-153"
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"en.20000411.6.2-153"2
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"Thank you very much, Mr President, for allowing me to speak. This is my maiden speech in this Chamber.
I, too, welcome the initiative of a first EU-Africa summit. The need for it has been felt and discussed for nigh on 50 years. However, as a member of the Committee on Development and Cooperation, I must express my reservations at the lack of support from the European Parliament. I also condemn the fact that Agenda 2000 did not tackle the issue of the future responsibilities of the European Union towards developing countries. There are two sides to the issue: the request from Europe for African countries to respect human rights, good governance and democratic institutions, and the appeal, loud and clear, from the African countries for the cancellation of their debt, which is seen as responsible for stifling the development, economic growth and welfare of the communities.
A balance has to be found, and some common ground. Parliament has tried to tackle this issue several times in the past, apparently without ever achieving tangible results. We need a powerful, sincere, widespread initiative; there are calls from several different quarters, including the Holy See during this Jubilee year, for a substantial reduction, if not the total cancellation of the third world debt, by such means as to facilitate the inclusion of the most heavily indebted countries in the world production and trade circuit. In my view, we need to set up a structure to analyse the situations of the various different countries and assess their political situations, in order to establish by how much to reduce their debts or whether to cancel them. This would take into consideration the extent to which past financial aid has been put to good use, and therefore involve the governments, civil society, local churches and non-governmental organisations."@en1
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