Brussels, 06/06/2012 (Agence Europe) - Relations should be developed between the Arab Spring countries and the EU, with the focus on young people and links between people and not just between governments and elites, said EPP Group MEPs and members of Egyptian and Libyan civil society on Tuesday 5 June at the presentation of a survey on these partnerships. There can be no lasting change if young people are sidelined, said lecturer Cairo's Modern Academy Ehab Shalaby. Thus far, relations have been focused on the economy and geopolitical and geostrategic relations, said Greek MEP Georgios Koumoutsakos. It is clear that the focus has to be culture, and person-to-person relations, with well structured areas for action and definite objectives, he went on, adding that EU-Middle East-African relations had to be reinvented.
Speakers all underlined the importance of a new, better balanced dialogue, which assumes that the countries of the South are recognised as being the equals of the EU. “We need a master plan for cooperation between the EU and Egypt with mutual respect and dialogue”, said Shalaby, expressing the wish that such a plan be politically, economically and socially based and that it be modelled on the cooperation that exists in Europe among the EU countries (associations, political partnerships, etc).
Lithuanian MEP Radvile Morkünaité Mikuléniené said that the EU should be able to act and to help in the reforms in the Arab countries, but only as an adviser, or coach, since change had to come from the countries themselves and their inhabitants.
Her Italian colleague Franco Frattini argued that the new partnership must be centred on human rights, full respect for national distinctiveness, a common cultural framework with mutual understanding and a definite response to the demands of these countries. He said that the partnership must not be part of the Partnership for the Mediterranean, “which isn't working”, and he hoped that, in order to put in place real contact between people, the EU will review its visa and migration policies.
The survey on EU-Arab Spring country partnerships was conducted on a sample of 70,000 people in Egypt, Libya, Algeria, Iraq, Yemen, Tunisia, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Lebanon and highlights six areas for cooperation: education, cultural exchanges, empowerment of young people, economic cooperation, human rights and the development of democracy. The findings are available on http://www.springeneration.eu (CG/transl.rt)