EU tailors support to ambitions and aspirations of partners
The Eastern Partnership (EaP) is an instrument that allows the EU to tailor its support to the ambitions, needs and aspirations of its partners, Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighbourhood Policy Štefan Füle said today in Baku addressing the session of the Euronest Parliamentary Assembly, which he described as "a tool to advance democratisation and to exchange best practice among parliamentarians from partner countries and and EU Member States."
He told MEPs and parliamentarians from Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine that "making the values of liberty, democracy, human rights and fundamental freedoms and the rule of law a central part of our partnership we wish to extend the area of stability and security to the Eastern part of the continent."
Füle said he was pleased to see representatives of Armenia's parliament among the participants and deplored the absence of their Belarusian counterparts, adding:"I am guided by the long-term vision of a democratic and prosperous Belarus, free of political prisoners and strongly anchored in a common space of European values."
Füleemphasized that the EU's plan to increase its assistance to the partners based on the so called ‘more for more' principle was not for Southern neighbours only, in the wake of the Arab Spring, but applied to the Eastern partners as well.
"We want to assist our partners in completing political and economic reforms and adopting the European model of development that will guarantee long term stability," the Commissioner said.
Euronest's input is much needed for the progress of the Eastern Partnership, both for the implementation of agreed objectives and for the assessment the results, said Štefan Füle.
He also highlighted the need for a stronger dialogue between civil society and the authorities, which is now being maintained in the framework of the Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum, as well as through the regular structured dialogue between civil society and governments, launched in September 2011.
To maintain the momentum of the Warsaw Summit, the EU intends to establish informal Eastern Partnership Dialogues that would help strengthen links with partners and "when appropriate, to deepen sector cooperation,"the Commissioner said. He described these dialogues as "an instrument of political steering" that would strengthen sense of ownership of the Eastern Partnership on the side of the partners.(ENPI Info Centre)
