Treaty change IGC launched Portuguese Foreign Minister Luis Amado unveiled the draft Reform Treaty on Monday as the meeting of Foreign Ministers opened the Intergovernmental Conference (IGC) that needs to agree the text. Drafted by the Portuguese Presidency on the basis of the mandate adopted by EU leaders in June, the Reform Treaty, formally titled the Draft Treaty Amending the Treaty on the European Union and the Treaty Establishing the European Community, runs to 277 pages including 132 setting out protocols and declaration. The Reform Treaty, which will amend the Maastricht and Rome Treaties, seeks to keep most of the agreements reached in establishing the text of the draft Constitution. However some key political issues still need to be addressed by that the IGC including finalising the role of a European External Relations High Representative, and the composition of the External Action Service that would support the High Representative. Other key outstanding issues focus on changes to the voting system for decisions by the Council, and the legal status of the EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights. Amado said that the Presidency wanted to finalise the Treaty “as soon as possible” and would stick to the timetable to complete the work by the end of October.
Disagreements over governance allocations Several Member States and European Parliamentarians have been quite critical of the European Commission’s approach to governance in its aid programme. The Commission’s governance incentive initiative proposes using linking a part of the aid it provides to African, Caribbean and Pacific to governance profiles of the country. These profiles assess the degree of transparency, political accountability and respect of human rights but also the level of market openness and the willingness to repatriate illegal migrants and to fight terrorism. The finalisation of EU planning in the use of aid for ACP countries for 2008 to 2013 were held up due to disagreements on how the governance incentive tranches would be determined. Once settled the European Commission will finalise draft Country Strategy for its aid to ACP countries. Member States are expected to formally receive these papers in September or October 2007. They will then be discussed within the EDF committee and signed by the end 2007. While these strategies define the EU’s partnership with each ACP country for the coming years, concerns remain on the democratic nature of their adoption process. While the European Parliament played a recognised role in monitoring the adoption of the Country Strategy Papers for Asia, Latin America (DCI), North Africa and Southern Caucasus (ENPI), it is being denied the right to scrutinize assistance to sub-Saharan Africa, Caribbean and Pacific countries.
German Minister supports EP role in democratic scrutiny In their meetings with the German and Portuguese presidency and the External Relations commissioner on 17th July 2007, European Parliamentarians asked for a strengthened involvement in the monitoring of ACP CSPs, in addition to the limited role given to the ACP/EU Joint Parliamentary Assembly, which in the best case scenario will not be in a position to deliver any comment on the CSPs before mid 2008 or 2009. Germany’s Minister responsible for development cooperation, Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul, re-iterated her support for the European Parliament to play a role in scrutinising the country strategies of African, Caribbean and Pacific countries. Speaking at a meeting of the Parliament’s Development Committee Wieczorek-Zeul said “I would like to follow your suggestion to involve the European Parliament on the ACP CSPs. However another Member State in the Council is not happy about this suggestion and it is therefore blocked. I think I am clear”. It is widely understood that France has blocked agreement in the Council to the suggestion the German Minister made to the Development Committee early in her country’s Presidency for a European Parliament involvement. The Joint Parliamentary Assembly (JPA) set up as part of the EU’s cooperation with ACP countries has been tasked with this role instead. However, the JPA only has an advisory role and meets just twice a year. At the same meeting the Portuguese Secretary of State, Joao Gomes Cravinho, outlined the incoming Portuguese Presidencies development priorities. These are fragile states, development and migration, the finalisation of the Economic Partnership Agreements, and the Joint EU-Africa strategy and summit.
EU told to protect civilians as Chad mission launched The European Union is to launch a peace-keeping mission in eastern Chad as a response to attacks on civilians from militia crossing the country’s border with Sudan. Some 230,000 refugees from the Sudanese province of Darfur and 170,000 people uprooted due to violence within Chad are taking shelter in makeshift camps in eastern Chad, an arid region with little infrastructure. As well as suffering from widespread malnutrition, the refugees have had to contend with incursions from the Janjaweed militia that have been accused of waging a campaign of genocide against the Zaghawa, Fur and Masalit communities in Darfur with the support of the Sudanese government. The security situation has been worsened further by rampant banditry and ethnic tensions within Chad. Meeting in Brussels this week (July 23-24), the EU’s foreign ministers approved the deployment of a peace-keeping mission to the region. The mission is to be composed of 3,000 troops and to be flanked by a police operation involving 1,000 personnel. Amnesty International has urged that the mission must offer adequate protection to the most vulnerable civilians in Chad. The human rights group has recently gathered evidence, suggesting that displaced women have been raped by members of armed groups, including the national army, in Chad, without those responsible for these crimes being held to account. “Collecting firewood or water can be a life-threatening dilemma for these women and girls since their families cannot survive if they don’t venture out of the camps and villages to fetch the basics,” said Dick Oosting, director of Amnesty’s office in Brussels. “In light of the failure of the Chadian government to protect its citizens, it is vital that an EU or UN force has the mandate and resources to protect these women and children as well as any other civilians at risk.”
WTO farm offer won’t stop EU ‘dumping’ on poor countries - Oxfam The World Trade Organisation is to announce later this week (27 July) if talks aimed at reaching a new agreement on regulating international commerce should proceed. This follows proposals put forward by two of the chairmen in the troubled Doha round of world talks. Crawford Falconer, who is chairing the negotiations on agriculture, and Don Stephenson, who is in charge of trade in industrial goods, presented papers on 17 July aimed at reviving the Doha round, which is mired in disagreement over such issues as farm subsidies in rich countries and the degree to which poor countries would be required to open their markets to imports. The papers suggest that a ceiling of €16.5-27.6 billion should be placed on the EU’s trade-distorting ‘domestic supports’ for farmers – subsidies which are not officially designed to promote exports but nonetheless have a profound impact on the livelihoods of poor farmers. Celine Charveriat from Oxfam’s Geneva office gave a guarded welcome to the proposal. “This is a step in the right direction but is very unlikely to bite into actual spending,” she said. “Unless severe caps are put on specific products, these new figures would mean that dumping of cheap produce, which is so damaging to developing countries, will not be eliminated.”
EU urged to rethink aid efforts in middle-income states An excessive number of aid donors is hampering efforts to make development assistance more effective, a new study has found. After examining European Union aid to Cambodia, Mozambique and Peru, the Overseas Development Institute (ODI) in London calculated that these countries have to deal with 15-17 bilateral donors from the EU, as well as the European Commission. The figure is even higher if bodies representing regions like Catalonia in Spain or Flanders in Belgium – both of which have offices in Mozambique – are included. Some of the most serious problems were found in Peru. Despite the country’s rapid economic growth over the past decade, poverty rates have changed very little there, with half the population deemed poor and one-fifth living in extreme poverty (on less than one dollar a day). The report cites an unnamed source in the European Commission’s delegation to Peru who argued that the momentum to align aid with national policies had been lost in areas such as alleviating poverty. Although the report says that the Peruvian Agency for International Cooperation (APCI) has “done a remarkable job” since it was founded to coordinate donors in 2002, it still has to deal with 900 implementing bodies – both private and public – and some 2,500 projects per year. “It is also not helpful that APCI is regarded by many public and private agencies as a nuisance and at best a front desk and that it lacks political support and weight in the higher levels of government,” the report explains. The Commission’s staff in Peru “feel swamped by administrative tasks and project demands,” the paper adds. The ODI’s Andrew Lawson said that the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, which oversees the activities of aid donors, was “disconcerted” about statements made by the Commission about how it is seeking to give more power to its staff in recipient countries. This process of “deconcentration” has been presented as “something of a fait accompli”, he said, whereas in reality “authority remains unnecessarily centralised” in Brussels. Lawson urged the Commission to assess if its staff constraints make it wise to continue having delegations in countries such as Peru, which are classified as “lower middle-income” by international bodies. “It is not our mandate to suggest that delegations should be closed,” he said. “But maybe some of them should.” Lawson was speaking to a meeting of the European Parliament’s development committee last week.
Arms ban on Burma could be flouted A European Union ban on supplying weapons to Burma’s military junta risks being circumvented, human rights campaigners have been warned. India is seeking to sell an advanced attack helicopter (ALH) to Burma, which is officially known as Myanmar. The helicopter was developed in association with the German firm Eurocopter Deutschland and contains components from France, Belgium, Italy, Britain and Sweden. Roy Isbister from the conflict prevention group Saferworld pointed out that the EU’s embargo, which dates from 1988, “explicitly states that no military equipment should be supplied, either directly or indirectly, for use in Myanmar.” “What’s the point in having an arms embargo if it is not going to be implemented or enforced?” India is currently the fourth largest trading partner with Burma, a country where human rights abuses including torture, summary executions and the recruitment of child soldiers are systematic, according to the UN. The New Delhi and Rangoon governments have set a target of achieving a trade worth $1 billion between the two countries in 2006-07.
MEPs delay patents law in protest at EU stance on cheap drugs for poor The European Parliament’s committee on international trade has voted to reject calls from the other main EU institutions that it swiftly rubber-stamp an intellectual property accord officially designed to boost the supply of cheap medicines to the poor. In 2003, the EU helped broker a temporary waiver to the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) agreement on intellectual property rights, which is known by the acronym TRIPS. The waiver was designed to allow poor countries lacking production capacity to address public health emergencies by importing cheap generic versions of patented drugs produced under a compulsory licence. Four years later, the EU’s executive, the European Commission, and many of its member governments are intent on ratifying a protocol amending TRIPS in order to make the waiver permanent by a 1 December deadline. Meeting last week (17 July), the European Parliament’s committee on international trade decided to delay on giving its assent to ratification because it is not satisfied that the EU is doing enough to boost the supply of vital drugs to the needy. As not one poor country had yet invoked the waiver, MEPs have complained that it has proven too complex and ineffective. On 19 July, however, the WTO announced that Rwanda had become the first country to announce it intends to make use of the waiver. French Socialist MEP Kader Arif said that the trade committee will need a “solemn undertaking” from the Commission and EU governments “that Europe will be actively involved in finding new solutions.” “In line with the public’s wishes, the EU should aim to be a world leader in the effort to make affordable medicines available throughout the world,” he added. “This is about far more than simple ratification of an international protocol. It’s about a political and humanitarian problem on a huge scale, the response to which requires real political will. We call upon the Commission to come forward with urgent alternative measures aimed at helping developing countries develop their own production capacity for pharmaceutical products.”
