Negotiations between the EU Council and the European Parliament on the proposal to strengthen the EU's civil protection mechanism are not progressing at all. The third trilogue political negotiation meeting, scheduled for Monday 26 November, has been cancelled, much to the displeasure of the rapporteur, Italian Elisabetta Gardini (EPP).
This is the second postponement of a trilogue that was originally scheduled to take place in early November on this proposal to make the collective response more effective in the event of a natural or man-made disaster, in particular through the creation of a reserve of resources, called RescEU (see EUROPE 12131). The deadline was to be used to reconcile the negotiators' positions, in particular on the financing of the RescEU reserve.
Mrs Gardini accused the Council of being the source of the blockage, since it did not give the Austrian Presidency a revised negotiating mandate.
"The navel-gazing on the part of the Council is unacceptable. RescEU is about saving lives. EU ministers are wasting time because of a deadlock in the Council. Each additional day of delay compromises the deployment of RescEU in time for the next forest fire season", she warned in a statement. According to her, "the Council must understand that blocking such an urgent reform, represents a political fault”. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)