Brussels, 17/04/2003 (Agence Europe) - The Council of Ministers of the EU has decided, for the present time, not to draft up an additional budget of 32 million euros in loan commitments (and 10 million euros in payment loans) in order to finance destructive measures for fishing vessels. The Council, therefore, refuses at this stage the main element of the preliminary correctional and supplementary budget plan (BRS) n°1/2003 brought forward by the Commission at the end of February (see EUROPE of the 27th February). The Council believes that the proposal is “premature, since the applications of the member States are still not yet known” and stresses that, for the year 2003, the financing of these measures “must chiefly be ensured by redeployment”. The Commission would suggest conversely to call upon the instrument of flexibility in order to finance these measures, no margin continues to exist in 2003 under the groundwork of the rubric in question of structural funds. Let's remember that instruments of dismembering constitute one of the most important elements of the “reform package” of the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) adopted by the Council last December. The European Parliament, shall give its opinion with respect to this BRS at the May session in Strasburg, should for its part support this Commission proposal.
The Council has accepted, all the same, the two technical aspects of this BRS: - the creation of a new budgetary outline “The Information Programme for European Citizens (PRINCE) - The role of the European Union in the world ”; - the modifying of the title (and the comment relating to it) of the budgetary outline “European MBA in human rights and democratisation” which would become “European inter-university centre”.