Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-02-16-Speech-4-217"
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"en.20060216.24.4-217"2
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".
Mr President, once again I should like to thank the honourable Members for their contributions.
First of all, let me state that the Commission is continuing to follow the situation in Sri Lanka very closely and we welcome the interest shown by European Parliament political groups in the resolutions calling for a peaceful solution to the conflict for the people of Sri Lanka.
The Commission welcomes the agreement between the Government of Sri Lanka and the LTTE to hold talks in Geneva on 22 and 23 February, with a view to reinforcing and improving the implementation of the ceasefire agreement concluded in February 2002. We congratulate the Norwegian Minister, Erik Solheim, for his tireless efforts and reiterate our full support for him and for Norway’s role as facilitator in the peace process.
Regarding the situation in Sri Lanka, although violence appears to have declined since the announcement of the Geneva talks on 25 January, we are extremely concerned by the escalation of violence in the past few months. Over 200 people were killed between the election of the new president in November 2005 and the end of January 2006. The European Union has expressed its grave concern about the continuing violence in Sri Lanka and urged all those engaged in violence and those with influence on them to put an end to it and stop the descent into conflict.
The year 2005 and the early part of 2006 were bad periods for the peace process, with the failure of the P-TOMS, the assassination of Foreign Minister Kadirgamar and the electoral boycott imposed in parts of the north and east. We therefore welcome the Geneva talks as an important step, which we hope will help stabilise the situation in Sri Lanka and lead to the long hoped for peaceful resolution of the bitter conflict.
Regarding the comments made about the tsunami funds, we have started delivering tsunami reconstruction, despite the failure of the P-TOMS. The Commission allocated tsunami victims in Sri Lanka EUR 5.5 million of assistance to revitalise livelihoods in the north and east and provide affected communities there with basic economic opportunities. That comes on top of a large EC assistance programme already running in the north and the east.
What we expected from P-TOMS was to move to a full reconstruction process where the government, the LTTE and the Muslim community would agree on priorities and projects. We had put all our weight behind P-TOMS and had earmarked EUR 50 million to go through the mechanism. Commissioner Ferrero-Waldner made that public in March 2005 in Colombo, where we pressed very hard for a quick agreement. We still consider that that was the right thing to do. If P-TOMS had come to life, we would have reversed the negative trend in the peace process.
In addition to that, we should not forget that the Commission, through its Directorate General for Humanitarian Aid, has provided more than EUR 23 million to victims of the conflict in the north and east since the peace process began, and over EUR 40 million of aid to tsunami victims. A large part of that aid has been directed at linking humanitarian aid to the reconstruction effort."@en1
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