Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2010-09-23-Speech-4-041"
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"en.20100923.2.4-041"2
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"Mr President, honourable Members, this is not the first time I have addressed you, but for the first time I have received many questions which actually go beyond the framework of the original question. I welcome that and hope that I will be able to explain.
Turning to a specific question on Russia and Ukraine from the honourable Member Mr Belder, I just would like to add that I hope very much that our cooperation with partners, and specifically with Ukraine, will not be based on competition with any third country and that there will not be a zero-sum game approach but a win-win situation improving the situation in the region as a whole.
I am sure that I have not been able to address all your questions but I will look at them in the course of the CBC policy review, and I will also find a way to answer them in writing because I feel they are important and that we should address them again in the framework of this review process.
Let me give one more specific answer, concerning the idea of moving these programmes from DG RELEX to DG REGIO. I do not think that this will solve the challenges I mentioned at the beginning. On the contrary, it would mean the foreign policy issue – which does exist – would be ignored, and I am sure that we have a lot of will within the current framework to find a way of making the programmes work better.
So now, let me thank you very much for the discussion on this particular issue. Thank you very much for a number of good ideas which we will also tackle with you when we go through this neighbourhood policy review process.
Coming back to the original questions with which we started our discussions, I absolutely agree with those who consider cross-border cooperation to be a way of melting down borders as much as possible, particularly when we are talking people-to-people contacts. The time of the walls belongs to the past and the cross-border cooperation programmes make a significant contribution to that fact.
Let me start with the timing of various steps. I already mentioned in my statement that the Commission is now in the process of undertaking a mid-term review of CBC; that will be ready in December 2010. As regards the ENPI Regulation, that was reviewed in its mid-term review in 2009. All the financial allocations will, then, be clarified by the end of this year and we will table legislative proposals on the so-called ENPI II by the end of next year, though that is already looking into the future, beyond 2013.
On the issue related to this – and this is where we are, concerning the funds and Russia – I can say that everything is on time, taking into account the difficulties I have mentioned. Everything is on time concerning the EU funds. There are some small delays in adding the Russian money due to some technical issues on their side, but that should be clarified soon.
Mr Brok is absolutely right concerning how EU regional policy and territorial cooperation on EU external borders should be combined; I could not have put it better myself. Our instruments aim at making this cooperation as easy as possible, bringing together regions in the EU Member States and in our partner countries. Here I strongly believe that our discussion today should not be seen in isolation but as, hopefully, creating a momentum for closer interaction with many of you. I have heard from many representatives with wide experience in this area, so I shall be ready to use all the communications channels we have at our disposal – while also being creative to add some other informal channels – so as to make as much use as possible of that experience, because it is important that we pass the reality check on this particular issue of CBC.
However, it is important that we also pass a reality check on neighbourhood policy, and I welcome the fact that a number of you raised this issue. You know that in conjunction with the High Representative and Vice-President of the Commission, Cathy Ashton, we have indeed initiated a review process of our neighbourhood policy. The last neighbourhood package, which we presented in the spring, assessed not just last year’s achievements but the achievements of all five years.
With Cathy Ashton, we thought this to be an excellent basis from which to consider a number of questions: Is our policy right? Are we going in the right directions? Do our partners feel they have ownership of this policy? Have we got our instruments right? Do we have the necessary resources? And including the questions: Are we still talking about neighbourhood policy in terms of instruments and defining the goal of neighbourhood policy as ensuring peace, stability and prosperity on the borders of the European Union?
Should we not also be starting, at least, to discuss the questions: Is there an end game for this policy? Is there a goal we could define? Is there something which would make it more attractive for our partners to work and cooperate with us? These are the questions we have started to address with the Member States, with our partner countries, think-tanks and civil society organisations, but also, of course, with you. We are now working with the Chair of the Committee on Foreign Affairs to find suitable dates and times. Once again, on this particular issue I am looking to be creative about informal contacts with you, because this is a very important issue and I hope very much that by presenting a new neighbourhood package in the spring of next year we will be ready to share with our partners and the rest of the world the results of this review policy.
The review policy will not focus solely on the three pillars as we know them today: political association, economic integration and the mobility issue. We will also focus most definitely on how our values are to be reflected in this new policy, on how we can make our argument about human rights and fundamental freedoms stronger – not only in certain parts of our neighbourhood but across the board. In addition, we have some concrete issues to discuss with countries such as Ukraine and Tunisia, and with some others. But this is engagement, which will bring us to the negotiating table, and it is our assistance and our insistence on these roles which will help those countries reach a suitable level."@en1
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