Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-04-12-Speech-3-177"
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".
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, I must start by congratulating the rapporteur, Mr Lagendijk, on his excellent and important report. The debate caused by this could not have come at a better time. As you know, the Special European Council held in Lisbon reiterated the strategic priority for the European Union of ensuring peace and stability in South-Eastern Europe and, as such, this is an issue which is on the EU’s immediate agenda and permanently on our political agenda.
However, the conference was only one initial step in a long process. The European Union is committed to acting as leader and guaranteeing the coherent management of this whole support process. It has also pledged to closely monitor and support the regional reform processes in a way which corresponds to the efforts made by each country so that these can be rewarded with advances in the development of new instruments. This will allow economic and social development and progress in line with European standards. With the exception of Belgrade, all the governments in the region have stated that they will start on the road to reform. I must clarify, however, that the Council considers that, without Serbia, our common efforts will be incomplete. A democratic and cooperative Serbia, at peace with its neighbours, will be welcomed within the European family. We must be aware that overall stability in this region can never be complete when one country in the region represents a factor of instability. This message about Serbia must be received by the respective civil society. Our support for Montenegro and for the stabilisation efforts being made in this country by the respective government must also be reconfirmed.
To conclude, we also note that the rapporteur intends that the mandate of the European Reconstruction Agency should not be limited to Kosovo. In the meeting of 20 March, the Council invited the Commission to work on a proposal and to present this to the Council with a view to including Montenegro in the Agency’s mandate. Discussions are also ongoing about the possible extension of the EIB’s activities.
Finally, the Council has invited the Secretary-General and High Representative, under the authority of the Council presidency and in full cooperation with the Commission, to ensure the coherence of the policies for the Western Balkans. At the last General Affairs Council, an initial commentary was given on these ideas which specifically stem from the presentation given by Commissioner Patten and Mr Solana. We are sure that in future meetings of the General Affairs Council this issue will be followed with close attention and by effective steps towards its realisation.
The European Union is by far the body which has contributed the most aid to this region. Between 1991 and 1999, the total aid from the EU to South-Eastern Europe, including that from the EU as a whole and the Member States individually, was in excess of EUR 19.3 billion. The EU is furthermore the main trading partner of all the countries in this region. It has allowed valuable trade concessions and, as you know, several thousand soldiers, police officers and civilian workers from the EU are active in the region, particularly in Kosovo.
We read with great interest the rapporteur’s conclusions on the stabilisation and association process for South-Eastern Europe. The assessment of the solidity and possible deficiencies of this process certainly provides points for discussion and I will try to comment on some of these. The Lisbon European Council confirmed that our overall objective remains the greatest possible integration of the countries in the region within Europe’s political and economic system. The Stabilisation and Association Agreements constitute a central point of this policy. As the rapporteur quite rightly notes, these new agreements will not enter into force immediately as we firstly have to prepare, negotiate and conclude each one. As a result, the rapporteur concludes that it will be necessary to create a type of medium-term stabilisation and regional development programme.
I am not necessarily convinced that this is the most appropriate way of tackling the problem. The general stabilisation process for the area cannot, by any stretch of the imagination, be reduced to just agreements. Clearly these are, shall we say, the most visible and most well-known feature of this process, but other important instruments are required such as preferential trade agreements, direct aid from the European Union and political dialogue. Most of the countries already benefit from trade preferences and the Lisbon Special European Council confirmed that the Stabilisation and Association Agreements should be preceded by greater asymmetric trade liberalisation thereby specifically favouring these countries in their bilateral trade with EU countries.
The idea underlying the stabilisation and association process is sufficiently broad and flexible to ensure a constant project in this area. With regard to the agreements, the fact that it is taking some time to prepare these should not, in our opinion, jeopardise the whole stabilisation process. This has not been the EU’s experience in equivalent regional processes in the past. As with other comprehensive agreements, we therefore hope to be able to establish interim agreements covering the period between the signature and ratification of these agreements, bearing in mind that normally almost twenty months pass between these two events. It is also worthwhile to remember that we already have contractual relations in the form of trade and cooperation agreements with Albania and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. The new agreements, which will be more comprehensive and also more demanding on our partners given that they include elements of political conditionality which obviously form part of the Union’s current approach in this area, will specifically replace the existing agreements in these two cases. They will concentrate much more on regional cooperation than the current agreements and will include provisions on cooperation in the area of justice and home affairs, an area which is of great importance to the Europe of the future.
Negotiations have already begun with the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia on the Stabilisation and Association Agreement. The Albanian Government recently indicated its reaction to the viability study on the opening of negotiations, which was prepared by the European Commission, and the Council will very shortly analyse this report. Following internal political changes, the European Commission is also to prepare a viability study for Croatia which the Council hopes to be able to analyse immediately before or after the summer.
Bearing in mind the request made by the local authorities, Bosnia-Herzegovina was sent a guide whose use will help towards preparing a viability study on negotiations for an agreement of the same type. This work is moving forward at a good pace given, of course, that in this specific case, we must be careful and not create excessive expectations, as the reality of the situation there does not allow us to be overly optimistic in this respect.
I should like to refer briefly to the new regulation. As we agree with the European Parliament about the need to create a uniform legal basis for support to the region, the Council is waiting for a Commission proposal on a Council regulation which will replace the support granted to the region by the Phare and Obnova programmes. The recommendations to be made will form a valuable contribution to the debates which we will start within the Council on this issue. I note in particular that the report highlights that the reconstruction of the region must not be regarded as merely physical and economic but must also be aimed at the social infrastructure, civil society and the public institutions. These are the main objectives of our reconstruction strategy for the area which does not just involve a merely physical dimension but also an overall stabilisation dimension.
The rapporteur also refers briefly to the Stability Pact on which we have been cooperating with these five countries and with the countries involved in the enlargement process. The recent regional financing conference which was organised jointly by the European Commission and the World Bank, in close cooperation with the Special Coordinator for the Stability Pact, gave significant impetus to the Pact’s objective of reviving the reform processes and stimulating regional cooperation. It proved that the Stability Pact mechanism has already gained a certain maturity and can and must advance. We believe that reciprocal commitment is the key to the Pact’s success and I feel that this point was made very clear in the recent discussions at the Commission and World Bank conference. The commitment of the countries in the region to implement institutional policy reforms and to create an environment allowing economic progress is a fundamental element in this Pact. In return, the international community is supporting the reform commitments and the donors and financial institutions have promised or mobilised a total of EUR 2.4 billion. Of this amount, the European Union alone, that is, the Commission and Member States combined, have promised or mobilised EUR 1.08 billion. The international community has financed in particular a quick-start package of EUR 1.8 billion announced at the conference and has made available the necessary financing to accelerate the preparation and implementation of projects and initiatives in the short-term package."@en1
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