Brussels, 01/02/2012 (Agence Europe) - During a session of the Euro-Mediterranean Regional and Local Assembly (ARLEM) on Monday 30 January in Bari, the Arco Latino network of local authorities in Western Mediterranean rim countries (Italy, France, Spain and Portugal) announced the setting up of a “Latin Arc Cooperation Fund in the Mediterranean”. This new instrument aims to “carry out concrete actions with its partners from the South”.
Its president, Hervé Baro (also the vice president of the Aude regional department General Council in France), met the deputy secretary general of the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM), Lino Cardarelli, in Bari, to discuss opportunities for cooperation in projects on the southern and northern banks of the western Mediterranean. The organisation highlighted the need to be involved in “new cooperation opportunities resulting from the new institutional framework currently being implemented in different southern Mediterranean rim countries”. This need is further emphasised given that “the local intermediary powers are under threat within the context of the current financial crisis… austerity and economic readjustment plans carried out in Latin Arc countries have put local governments in a situation where they can no longer guarantee services to citizens and local boroughs.” The organisation has already demanded the opening of “structured dialogue” with the European Commission because the local authorities “constitute a fundamental factor in the fight against the financial and social crisis affecting Europe and the world”. The majority of decisions taken by the EU are applied by the local authorities, it explained. It also explains that it is “fundamental” that it be involved in developing European Community policies. It welcomed the decision taken by Brussels to develop the “Mediterranean Corridor” as a priority axis in the new EU Trans-European Transport Network. This corridor “represents considerable progress for competitiveness and growth in the regions involved, at the same time as an improvement in Spanish connections with France, Italy and the rest of Europe”. Arco Latino covers a vast geographical area, with more than 70 million inhabitants stretching over a very diverse territory consisting of coastal areas, islands and hinterlands. (FB/transl.fl)