Brussels, 28/01/2009 (Agence Europe) - In Bonn for the launch of the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) (see EUROPE 9827), Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs called on EU member states, most of which are signatories to the treaty setting up IRENA, to mandate the European Commission to negotiate the EU's joining the new agency. Piebalgs will ask the Council to discuss very shortly a Commission request for a mandate. “We should all support IRENA because it is a global agency, dedicated to renewables. At the moment, we have a number of different platforms for dialogue and political exchange, but not an appropriately funded agency that can make the difference,” he said. German Green MEP Rebecca Harms, a supporter of the proposal made by former Budget Commissioner Michaele Schreyer for a European renewables community, says in a press release: “Europe had a coal and steel community for 50 years and its nuclear agency Euratom has existed for over half a century. It is high time for the EU to make a clean break from dirty and dangerous energy, to follow the lead of IRENA and to create a European agency for enhanced cooperation on renewables.” (E.H./transl.rt)