Brussels, 24/02/2000 (Agence Europe) - The European People's Party Group in the European Parliament, chaired by Hans-Gert Pöttering, will hold a workshop from 6 to 8 March in Paris, to discuss, inter alia, the French Presidency of the EU Council that gets under way in July.
On 6 March, RPR President Michèle Alliot-Marie and the Presidents of Nouvelle UDF and Démocratie Libérale, François Bayrou and Alain Madelin (both Members of the EP), will outline the political situation in France. On 7 March, EP President Nicole Fontaine, European Commission Vice-President Loyola de Palacio and former Portuguese Foreign Minister José Manuel Barroso will speak on the Portuguese Presidency of the EU Council and Members will also hold discussions with Jean-Louis Quermonne, President of the Reflection Group on reform of the European institutions at the State Planning Commission. On 8 March, former President of the French Republic (and former MEP) Valéry Giscard d'Estaing and former Belgian Prime Minister (and Chair of the Group of Wise charged by the Commission with drafting a report on the institutional consequences of enlargement) Jean-Luc Dehaene will discuss with EPP Group members the start-up of the Intergovernmental Conference on institutional reform of the EU.