Brussels, 20/11/2002 (Agence Europe) - The General Affairs Council has adopted conclusions on the relations that the EU hopes to have with its "new" neighbours in Eastern Europe after EU enlargement: - Ukraine, Moldova and Belarus. The "New Neighbours Initiative" that the Council hopes to develop consists of an "ambitious, long term and integrated approach" by the EU towards each country in order to promote economic and political reform, sustainable development and trade. Each approach will be different depending on the political and economic particularities as well as the potential and the objectives of the different countries.
The Council specifies that, in the longer term, the development of relations between the EU and these three countries will depend on their implementation of reforms and their determination to respect their international commitments as well as common values on democracy, the rule of law and human rights. The Council points out that this initiative contributes to the EU's will to strengthen its relations with Russia and, in this framework, the EU encourages crossborder cooperation to combat organised crime, illegal immigration, as well as cooperation of the countries of this region with the Council of Europe and t he Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). Candidate countries will be able to contribute to such cooperation, the Council states.
Finally, in order to set this initiative in place and develop it, the Council invites the European Commission and the EU High Representative for CFSP, Javier Solana, to present detailed proposals as rapidly as possible involving candidate countries in this task.