Brussels, 26/09/2002 (Agence Europe) - The Committee of Permanent Representatives (Coreper) continued to examine, on Thursday evening, still in camera, the procedure proposed by the European Commission allowing the European Parliament not to be completely excluded from the debate on developing an ethical framework for human stem cell research. As we pointed out earlier, the Commission's proposal does not bring into question the compromise of the Danish Presidency providing for a freeze of Community funding for this kind of research until 2004 or the development of ethical rules by a regulatory committee composed of Member State and Commission representatives. The Commission would, however, report to the European Parliament during the first half of 2003 to go on to present a proposal of revision for the specific programme concerned (solely on the question of ethics with regard to stem cells) with a view to its formal adoption before the end of next year. This solution would allow the Parliament to be formally consulted even if it does not have codecision on specific programmes. EUROPE has reason to believe that the Danish Presidency hoped, with the support of Coreper, to add this question to the very beginning of the agenda of the General Affairs-External Relations Council to be held on Monday, to allow the Danish Science and Technology Minister, Helge Sander, who will be attending on this occasion, to announce to the press that all the elements required for implementation of the 6th framework programme on research have now been definitively adopted.