Brussels, 12/03/2008 (Agence Europe) - Three months from the 13 July deadline set by the president of the French Republic for the Euro-Mediterranean summit, it was becoming increasingly urgent that preparations for the Union for the Mediterranean should begin. After the compromise reached with Germany on 3 March in Hanover, a memo summarising the broad lines of the project has been forwarded to the delegations and, on Thursday evening, during the dinner of heads of state and government, President Nicolas Sarkozy is expected to present, in agreement with Chancellor Angela Merkel, a project that is to be fine-tuned in coming weeks.
The idea underpinning the Union for the Mediterranean is to “do more for the Mediterranean” based on “greater mobilisation which can only come from rim countries”, one French diplomat states. The Union for the Mediterranean should be developed on the basis of the Euromed project, adding “an additional element of governance”. As it is, the project essentially provides for the setting in place of a 20-member secretariat to be placed under the authority of a joint co-presidency (one state from the northern rim, one state from the southern rim). The Union for the Mediterranean would be launched on the basis of “three or four concrete, emblematical, mobilising, cooperation projects involving a sufficient number of partners”, one diplomat states, specifying that it is “not planned at this stage to create new financial structures or new resources”.
The project is due to be presented to the Committee of Permanent Representatives (Coreper) by the end of the month and discussed during the next Euromed meeting on 8 and 9 April. (O.J.)