Brussels, 10/02/2000 (Agence Europe) - Next Monday and Tuesday, 14 and 15 February, will be particularly busy and significant for the European Union, which in two days will: open the new Intergovernmental Conference charged with institutional reform; open accession negotiations with six new applicant countries; review relations with a number of third countries (involving several sensitive issues such as provisional application of the agreement with South Africa).
The work will be organised as follows:
- On Monday morning, beginning at 9.30, the Council will address internal Community issues, some of which are of great political significance, such as further progress on European security and defence policy, work on the Charter of Fundamental Rights, internal reform of the European Commission, preparation of the Lisbon Summit of 23 and 24 March and possibly the statute of Members of the European Parliament;
- late on Monday morning, the Fifteen will open the new Intergovernmental Conference (IGC). On Tuesday, the group charged with preparation of the ministerial deliberations, chaired by Mr Seixa da Costa, will have a preparatory dinner;
- on Monday afternoon, the Council will debate different aspects of the EU's external relations: Balkans, Middle East, Russia, Mexico, South Africa and Indonesia;
- late on Monday afternoon, the EU/Estonia Association Council will meet;
- on Tuesday, succession negotiations will open successively with: Malta; Romania; Slovakia; Latvia (and the Association Council will meet simultaneously); Lithuania (the Association Council will meet simultaneously); Bulgaria. This official opening will be preceded on Monday evening by a dinner between the Foreign Ministers of the EU and the applicant countries.
Further, Ministers may also:
- meet the new Prime Minister of Croatia;
- be briefed on the latest positive developments in preparation of the EU/Africa summit. This week's talks in Algiers and Marrakesh (see EUROPE of 9 February, page 8) were quite positive; certain questions still need to be settled (and will be discussed at the meeting in Pretoria on 22 February) but the perspectives are now favourable.
See page 3 and below for a first look at the issues at hand. EUROPE will return tomorrow with details on the different items on the Council agenda.