Brussels, 28/01/2005 (Agence Europe) - On the sidelines of the General Affairs Council on 31 January, the EU and Tunisia are to hold the 5th session of their Association Council. Both sides will examine cooperation under the agreement currently in force (competition, standards, rules of origin, energy, transport, migration etc). The EU hopes to activate the sectorial sub-groups that have been set up, and reach agreement on a sub-group on political issues. Overall, the state of play with this cooperation is seen positively in Brussels, although a few Member States (France, Spain and Portugal) are pushing for Tunisia to open up its markets to their processed agricultural products. The Commission is pleading for the liberalisation of trade in services and the (mutual) right of establishment, and intents to ask for a negotiation mandate in the near future. In Brussels, the “pioneering role” of Tunisia in bilateral relations, such as under the EuroMed process, has been brought to the fore, and it is expected that the “neighbourhood policy” will provide “new opportunities to deepen and consolidate” relations.
This positive assessment is particularly true in the field of the economy. Recommendations have been that Tunisia make progress “at its own pace” towards a share in the values underpinning common action. A certain amount of conditionality is implicit: “the relationship will be determined by the degree of commitment in favour of these common values and principles” and “will develop depending on the efforts made and achievements towards respecting these commitments”. Clearly, the funding of the “neighbourhood policy” will depend on this. The commitment to this path can be seen in the development of the action plan, produced by the Commission on a “made-to-measure” basis, working directly with Tunisia (as was the case for other countries of the region). Tunisia, for its part, is to hold on internal debate on the “plus value” of this plan compared to the association agreement. The EU hopes to increase the pace, and stresses that it is how the detailed provisions of each action plan are implemented that will “bear witness to ambitions for future relations”, and that the political aspects have an “essential” nature. The EU takes note of political announcements made in Tunisia in favour of political openness but, under the “co-responsabilisation” it calls for, it states its readiness to “do its bit” to speed up “efforts to promote a genuinely pluralist democracy”, allowing “all components of civil society participate fully and without hindrance in public life”. Specific gestures are expected from Tunis allowing the direct European funding of Tunisian associations, and, ahead of the “world information society summit” to take place in Tunisia in late 2005, facilitating the presence of NGOs. The Tunisians feel that political choices are first and foremost national and should be made depending on their specific political and historical nature, that the procedure should be global, and that the priority should be granted to the fight against poverty, the consolidation of the social fabric and resolute action to promote health, education, young people and women's rights.
The EU currently notes that progress has been made by Tunisia in reforming its economic structure and pledges support and assistance to continue the process; The Tunisians state, however, that they have seen a fall in financial support under MEDA (from 100 million EUR in 2003-2004 to 75 million for the bi-annual financial year of 2005-2006), which they consider regrettable just as they enter the final phase (2008) of their process of tariff dismantling from the EU, which is particularly delicate, as the impact will be twice as great due to the end of the system of textiles quotas in application of the WTO rules. Preserving the textiles sector is a major priority of Tunisia, as is underlining its “mutual” nature, because many European investors have interests in Tunisia. The Commission is called on to lend a hand to safeguard this “integrated sector”, and at least to compensate the drop in financial assistance via more marked actions to promote investment.
More generally, under the “neighbourhood” policy, Tunisians hope to achieve “global and balanced” cooperation between all planks- political, economic and social- with adequate financial means. In particular, they stress the need for permanent concertation, to increase respect for their ownership.