The EU Member States’ Transport Ministers will meet in Luxembourg on Thursday 2 June for a Transport Council with a heavy agenda.
The competent Ministers will start the day by trying to find a general approach for the three major dossiers of the ‘Fit for 55’ package, namely the text on the deployment of alternative fuel infrastructure (AFIR) (see EUROPE 12957/18) and the development of sustainable and alternative fuels and energies in the aviation (‘ReFuelEU Aviation’) (see EUROPE 12948/7) and maritime (‘FuelEU Maritime’) (see EUROPE 12954/7) sectors.
“We hope that we can see a general approach. These three texts to be discussed tomorrow at the Transport Council are the first elements of the overall package to be approved by Ministers”, commented a senior EU diplomat.
However, the diplomat added, “certain elements” still need to be “settled” on some of these files, such as ‘ReFuelEU Aviation’.
“Coreper (the ambassadors of the Member States to the EU, Editor’s note) has examined the text twice. Several parameters are on the table and need to be settled, including the EU targets and aspects related to the amount of alternative fuels available at the different deadlines”, he said.
In addition, Member States are also expected to adopt a common position on the deployment of Intelligent Transport Systems (see EUROPE 12956/19) and on the legislative proposal on enhanced stability requirements for ro-ro passenger ships.
An exchange of views - followed by a debate - is also planned in the afternoon on the state of progress of the Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T), before the Ministers discuss the ‘CORSIA’ compensation mechanism (see EUROPE 12958/11), for which the Council of the EU adopted its mandate for interinstitutional negotiations on Friday 20 May.
At the end of the day, the Czech Minister will present the work programme of the future Presidency of the Council of the EU, which will begin on 1 July.
Finally, the lunch will be devoted to the situation in Ukraine. The Ministers will be asked to discuss and evaluate potential support measures for Kyiv, as EU leaders agreed on the sixth package of sanctions against Russia on the night of Monday 30 to Tuesday 31 May (see EUROPE 12961/1).
See the agenda: https://aeur.eu/f/1wd (Original version in French by Thomas Mangin)