Brussels, 13/06/2012 (Agence Europe) - The European regions are lending strong support to the ongoing decentralisation process in Arab Spring countries. The Euro-Mediterranean Regional and Local Assembly (ARLEM) was held in Rabat (Morocco) on 12 June. The Moroccan minister for home affairs, Mohand Laenser, said at the meeting that “Morocco is facing the crucial challenge of regionalisation” - a stage that the president of the Committee of the Regions (CoR), who is also co-president of the ARLEM, Mercedes Bresso, described as a “major challenge” which would help provide regional bodies with a new priority role. The expertise that European regions could provide is therefore essential and the president of the Moroccan region of Taza-Al Hoceima-Taounate, Mohamed Boudra, the other co-president, is convinced of this: “On the south shore of the Mediterranean we are living in a historical moment of transformation… the ARLEM is giving its relevant contribution to support this process, and to promote the exchange of good practice and the establishment of new synergies within the Euro-Mediterranean partnership.” Indeed, it is not just Morocco that is affected but all the different efforts made in the region of the Arab Spring to decentralise the institutional framework, emphasised Bresso. She thought this was even more important because these regions prove “that democracy is impossible without the effective participation of local communities in the shaping and implementation of policies and rules”. ARLEM will continue its work on the subject during its fourth General Assembly in Antalya (Turkey) this coming January. (MD/transl.fl)