Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-09-25-Speech-2-264"
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"en.20070925.31.2-264"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much for your contributions.
I have already had the opportunity on previous occasions to explain, justify and inform the European Parliament about the first EU-Brazil Summit, its results and objectives. Moreover, the importance of this strategic partnership with Brazil has been amply highlighted by many Members here today and I cannot but welcome the fact that those Members who at first seemed doubtful or more hesitant about the intention of the Portuguese initiative, now in fact seem more favourable towards the strategic choice which Portugal, as the country holding the Presidency, but also the European Union as a whole, made with regard to Brazil.
Naturally we are speaking and have spoken here about Brazil’s importance politically and economically, and as regards the environment and energy, which are fundamental realities in the contemporary world which we cannot ignore. It would be odd, as pointed out here, if the European Union were to have strategic relationships, strategic partnerships with Russia, India and China, but not with Brazil. We believe that we have bridged that gap and we also believe that in a few years’ time everyone will unequivocally applaud this initiative by the Portuguese Presidency. However, we also always made it absolutely clear that this strategic partnership which we believe the European Union should establish with Brazil in no way excluded or limited other relations which we also wished to extend on the economic and political levels with Mercosur.
I must say, ladies and gentlemen, that I am fairly at ease about that because Portugal was always amongst those EU countries that always fought for a close and deep relationship of solidarity with the Mercosur countries in all aspects of that relationship. We therefore have no hesitation and do not wish to allow the impression to be created here that a partnership with Brazil excludes or could exclude a close partnership with the Mercosur countries.
Such a vision, which instead of being a vision of complementarity could be a vision of exclusion, does not seem helpful to us and, above all, does not seem to correspond to reality – quite the reverse. Furthermore, as has been pointed out here, it is the final statement from the EU-Brazil Summit itself which explicitly and completely unequivocally states that the European Union and Brazil will work together so that the EU-Mercosur Association Agreement might finally become a reality.
We are all aware of the ups and downs which the EU-Mercosur Association Agreement has gone through. We really are at an impasse due largely, as we know, to issues of trade between the European Union and Mercosur. The Doha Round began in the meantime and what happened there obviously also influenced the trade dimension of the EU-Mercosur negotiations.
I want to make it quite clear to you, however, that once the Portuguese Presidency considers that the minimum conditions are established to relaunch that debate and that relationship, we shall not hesitate; we also assure you that, if that is not during the Portuguese Presidency then Portugal as a Member State – as it has always done and as has always been its aim – will not fail to call the attention of its partners to the real need to relaunch the negotiations on the Association Agreement with Mercosur in all its dimensions.
In conclusion, I must tell you that we are considering holding, if possible still within the Portuguese Presidency, a high-level troika meeting with the Mercosur countries. We are studying that possibility and, as I say, as a possibility for the Portuguese Presidency’s agenda, which is, as you all know, a very full and very complex agenda, but we shall do what we can to be able to relaunch – at the political level too – this debate with the Mercosur countries."@en1
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