Brussels, 04/05/2005 (Agence Europe) - Jean-Claude Juncker, the prime minister of Luxembourg and currently president of the European Council, who was accompanied by Secretary of State for Culture Octavie Modert, was in Paris on 3 May at the invitation of the French government to take part in the “Rencontres pour l'Europe de la culture” also attended by the culture ministers of the 25 member States as well as 800 European artists. The aim of the event was to share experience and ideas with a view to building the edifice of a Europe of Culture. Mr Juncker described as an outrageous simplification the tendency to reduce the European Union to a Market Europe. The market is a tool that has allowed the European peoples to come closer to each other, just as the euro has been a test for pacification of Europe through other means, he commented. In his view, Europeans seem unable to experience pride at what they have accomplished over the last half a century. He also cautioned those who want to restrict Europe to no more than a free trade area, an approach that he described as insufficient for a continent as complex as Europe. In cultural matters, Mr Juncker supports a policy that is in full compliance with cultural and linguistic diversity and trusts that the Member Sates will dedicate at least 1% of their national budget to culture in order to bring the “cultural budget out of its mediocrity”. Furthermore, he defended upholding the cultural exception: “culture does not come under trade but is an attitude for life”, he pointed out. The president of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso, closed the “rencontres” with a speech in which he stressed the importance of culture as an essential element for successful European integration. Casting no doubt on the feeling of national belonging felt by each citizen, the Commission president was sceptical about the feeling of belonging to Europe. “Citizen participation in a project in which they can identify themselves is an indispensable condition for truly successful European integration (…). The cultural dimension is therefore not a sort of superficial decoration so that a bureaucratic edifice can be accepted or so that a political failing is embellished - on the contrary it is an essential element of European construction and a condition for its success”. Europe is too often seen as an economic affair and not sufficiently as a project of civilisation, Mr Barroso went on, saying it is legitimate for the EU to: - give more stimulation to intercultural dialogue (in this respect the Commission will propose that 2008 should be designated as the European Year for Intercultural Dialogue, Barroso announced); - encourage the mobility of artists and cultural operators and the diffusion of cultural goods; - give within such actions priority to those that bring old and new Member States closer together; - ensure that the specific nature of culture is respected throughout all policies. He concluded by saying: “Let us exploit these possibilities to allow a maximum number of citizens to have an identity, and to be involved personally in this adventure which is without precedent in the world, - the adventure of European integration”.