Strasbourg, 18/01/2002 (Agence Europe) - On Thursday, the European Parliament adopted, as such, the report by Spanish Socialist Carmen Cerdeira Morterero on the adoption of a framework decision concerning application of the principle of mutual recognition of pecuniary sanctions, thus approving an initiative by the United Kingdom, France and Sweden (the Parliament is simply consulted: see summary in EUROPE of 11 January, p.10). These three Member States proposed the framework decision in accordance with the conclusions of the Tampere Summit in October 1999 whereby the principle of mutual recognition was to become the cornerstone for judiciary cooperation in the EU, in both civil and criminal matters. To date, the crossborder implementation of pecuniary sanctions has been governed by the 1970 Convention of The Hague on the international value of repressive judgements (which has taken effect but has only been ratified by five Member States) and by the 1991 Convention on the enforcement of foreign criminal sentences (which has not yet taken effect).