Brussels, 03/12/2014 (Agence Europe) - On Wednesday 3 December, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker announced that the priorities of the Latvian Presidency of the Council (from January 2015) and those of the Commission are the same.
A probable agenda was announced at the end of a meeting between the college of commissioners and Latvia's Prime Minister Laimdota Straujuma (who was accompanied by eleven ministers from Latvia).
For its very first Presidency, Latvia has decided to highlight a competitive Europe, a digital Europe and a Europe committed to the outside world. Latvia's commissioner and former prime minister, Valdis Dombrovskis, stated that there were many common points in the priorities and he mentioned economic growth and the creation of jobs, support for investment and budgetary responsibility. “We want to accomplish very effective work together to make progress on the investment package and on initiatives to deepen the Economic and Monetary Union, to improve macro-economic governance and to strengthen economic growth and jobs creation”, he said, also mentioning foreign policy among the priority areas.
Emphasis on investment plan. Both the Latvian Presidency and the Commission are going to have to work on implementing the investment plan, which is due to be ready for mid-2015. “There is a lot of legislative work to do”, Juncker stated, because all the legislation is due to be ready for June. “The Latvian Presidency will be very helpful for this”, he said. “All the legislation will be ready during our presidency (…) because all Europeans are waiting for investment”, said Straujuma.
Questioned on the situation in Ukraine, Straujuma stated that Latvian action will depend on the situation. “If the situation normalises and if the Minsk agreements are implemented, there will be a discussion to reduce the level of sanctions. If this goes in the other direction, we will be obliged to discuss a stronger attitude”, she said. She recalled that it was “unacceptable” for one country to seize part of another country. (CG)