Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-02-28-Speech-3-197"
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"en.20010228.11.3-197"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, first I should like to thank the rapporteur, Mr Gallagher, for his report and for the support which he has given our proposal. Everyone who referred to the excellent fisheries relations which we have with Equatorial Guinea was quite right. These relations go back to 1984, when we concluded a framework agreement which is, in fact, a very important agreement for the Community because it opens up tuna fishing to our fleet in the Gulf of Guinea. The previous protocol to this agreement expired on 30 June last year. However, negotiations on a new protocol initially broke down, which is why we agreed with Equatorial Guinea that the old protocol should be extended by a year.
Since 1 July last year, the provisions of the protocol have applied provisionally, as it were, without any change to fishing possibilities or financial compensation. In the meantime, thank God, we have managed – at the beginning of this month – to sign a new protocol for the next three years. The text of the protocol is currently going through Commission channels and will then be submitted to Parliament and the Council for approval.
As far as the proposed amendments are concerned, I can accept the first two in principle. Nonetheless, I feel that they do not belong in the text of the regulation, as the forwarding of the required reports and information to Parliament is already regulated under the framework agreement signed by our two institutions on 5 July 2000.
However, the Commission is unable to accept Amendment No 3 because it would contradict the principle applied hitherto, that fisheries protocols are annexes to the framework agreement and that no special authorisation is therefore needed from the Council in order to negotiate an extension. It goes without saying that the Commission always abides by the Council's guidelines during negotiations as, of course, it did in the present case.
Now to the question raised in connection with Cape Verde. I do not share the view that there should be any special problem here, because our side and, more importantly, the main Member State affected, rejected what was on offer. What Cape Verde had in mind was for us to have to land all catches on the Cape Verde Islands. However as, for various reasons, there is no possibility for exporting from Cape Verde to the Union, it would have made little sense, because then we would have had no access whatsoever to this fish.
I cannot agree with the amendment by Mrs Attwooll and Mr Busk proposing that the shipowners rather than the Community should bear the cost of the agreement with Equatorial Guinea. If for no other reason than because this is not in keeping with the negotiating guidelines adopted by the Council back in 1980. The guidelines stipulate that the cost must be borne by the Community and the shipowners jointly, with the shipowners' contribution taking the form of licence fees."@en1
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