Brussels, 08/03/2002 (Agence Europe) - Whereas the European Council of Laeken had provided for the Chairman of the Convention on the future of Europe making an initial interim report at the European Council of Barcelona, it was finally agreed that Valery Giscard d'Estaing would not go to Barcelona next week, given that the Convention's work as to substance has not yet begun. This is what Valery Giscard d'Estaing's spokesman, Nikolas Meyer-Landrut confirmed when talking to the press, on 8 March, about the work of the Convention's Praesidium this week.
The Praesidium will meet again next week, and a Convention plenary will be held on 21 and 22 March which, said Mr. Meyer-Landrut, will be the first opportunity, after the inaugural session of 28 February, to broach issues of substance, the idea being that each member of the Convention will be able to speak out freely and, in particular, set out what they expect of Europe. To structure the debate, some questions of a fairly general nature will be put to the conventionals. Mr. Meyer-Landrut, moreover, acknowledged that, given the size of the Convention, they will have to limit the time people have to speak.
Procedural questions remain to be settled, the spokesman went on, recalling that, anyhow, it is the Convention that decides, and that the Praesidium's Secretariat simply gathers the different proposals presented to it. Among these proposals are new suggestions made by British Liberal-Democrat Andrew Duff, member of the EP delegation, aimed at reviewing the Convention's draft rules of procedure (see EUROPE of 1 March, p.5). One alteration proposed provides for the Praesidium being able to "invite a representative of the candidate countries to participate inn its work".
The problem of opening the Praesidium up to candidate countries (see EUROPE of 2 March, p.5) is currently being discussed with the ambassadors of these countries to the Union. The solution could be to host one (or maybe two?) representatives of these countries, but the problem will then arise as to the choice to make among them (and also between their governments and their parliaments). Another question raised by candidate States is that of the use of languages, at least for "important" documents submitted o the Convention The problem is obviously a political and symbolic one, but that also runs up against certain obvious budgetary constraints, the budget for the Convention having been set for this year (see EUROPE of 1 March, p.2).