Alternate Minister of Foreign Affairs Miltiadis Varvitsiotis today briefed the Parliamentary Committee on European Affairs on current developments regarding EU issues and on the Conclusions of the recent meetings of the General Affairs Council and the European Council. His remarks focused on the issues of EU enlargement in the Western Balkans; the EU budget and its reduction due to Brexit; and the European dimensions of the migration issue and how the European partners are dealing with this issue.
More specifically:
Regarding EU enlargement, he stressed that “we are against those who want the decoupling of the two countries’ accession. Those in favour of decoupling never gained momentum or a numerical majority in the Council. The relevant proposal in the European Council was submitted by a very few member states and not as part of their main position.” “Thus,” he continued, “the key issue was whether or not the enlargement would happen, and it seems that we are moving towards a lengthy, difficult process that will raise the bar for our neighbours.” He underscored that each country will be judged individually, on the basis of its own performance. “What is common to both is the timeframe for the starting date,” he said, adding that this is a political process that is very symbolic. “The decoupling of the two cases does not enhance the stability on our northern borders and may even create an imbalance, of which we would suffer the consequences. It will be beneficial for us, if we can ensure there is no decoupling of the two timeframes,” he concluded.
Regarding the EU Multiannual Financial Framework for 2021-2027 and funding of the Common Agricultural Policy, he stressed that it is not accurate to say that all of the countries of the South have the same policy on the CAP. He raised the example of France and its different perspective on the allocation of funding. He noted that Greece is the country with the most European assistance per hectare, but that this is not reflected in Greek farmers’ incomes. Greek farmers have the smallest farms, which means the assistance is inadequate. The external convergence that requires that subsidies come to the same level cannot be measured in terms of area yield, but must take into account the country’s geography, including its many islands, which leads to the fragmentation of farmland, meaning that allocation must be carried out differently. “The external convergence funds are under discussion,” he stressed. “At the end of these negotiations, our goal is to have received funding that is higher than last time,” he said.
He noted that we are talking about a smaller European budget, due to Brexit, which means it is impossible for our country to receive significant increases. “We will make every effort to keep us at or above the levels of the previous programmes,” he stated.
Regarding the migration issue and its European dimension, the Alternate Minister stressed that what is needed is a new agreement on migration and asylum that includes relaunching of the reforms to the Dublin regulations. He referred to the protection of human rights and stressed that the government is holding true to its campaign commitments, putting humanitarianism at first place and formulating a new legal framework that will define the migration issue. He also stressed that the European Union “is not a union of a la carte alliances, as some people would like it to be.” National policies are not exclusively up to the countries’ heads of government, but must have depth and continuity. “Therefore,” he said, “we will continue to talk and we will continue to do what we need to do. Instead of ‘labelling’ our partners and saying these are “bad Europeans”, we will show exactly how we can work together, breaking the taboos that exist on both sides,” he concluded.
October 30, 2019