Brussels, 19/02/2002 (Agence Europe) - The newly elected President of the European Chambers of Commerce and Industry (Eurochambres), Austrian , Christoph Leitl, indicated in a recent statement to the press that the priorities of his mandate were: access to financial resources for SMEs; Eurochambres involvement in the areas of research and transport in the interest of European companies and the development of an economic dialogue between different areas in the world. Mr Leitl stressed the need to continue developing the world-wide business network and strengthening the European institutions and enterprise. Mr Leitl considers it absolutely necessary that the European Commission acts more like a government and that there are, "closer ties with EU candidate countries with a view to establishing a common area for business and stability", which would remove the terrain on which extremism and terrorism breed. He also called for the setting up of a social and people-centred network that would help create stability and European prosperity. Eurochambres represents 1,500 chambers of commerce and industry in 36 countries (mainly in the EU, candidate and EFTA countries) - 15 million companies, 95% of which are SMEs.