Thank you very much Mr President. I would of course like to associate myself with the President-in-Office of the Council's remarks, Commissioner Patten's, and also Mr Brok's, about the tragic events that took place in Belgrade this morning and I support all the expressions of sympathy to Mr Djindjic's family and of course to all Serbs who are undoubtedly very shocked by what has happened there this morning. Let me also express the hope that this will not lead to disruption of the efforts towards greater stability in Serbia and in the former Yugoslavia as well. Let us return to the matter we are debating today. While the Iraq issue is putting the European Union under great pressure and the discord appears great, the European Union will shortly be beginning its first military operation under its own flag in FYROM. And within the wider Europe the Union is now itself taking direct responsibility for an important peacekeeping operation. That this is happening in Macedonia is logical because of the great political efforts of the European Union in recent times, which have led to better relations within the country itself, in particular with the Albanian minority, and which have therefore also led to greater political stability. The military mission must of course help make these positive developments permanent. It has taken a while to conclude the mandate of the mission because the European Union cannot of course undertake this mission without the support of NATO and cooperation with it. It was therefore a question of finding the right formula with regard to the independent nature of the operation. This experience shows that we have to keep working on improving the European Union’s own capacities so that there will come a time when the European Union can handle such an operation on its own. The step that is now being taken is in itself important for the country in question, but as has already been said, it is also a first exercise for the European Union and the lessons from it will be learned. In this case it is a matter in particular of practical cooperation with NATO, but also of a future larger-scale operation, in Bosnia-Herzegovina for example. Conflict prevention is one of the most important basic principles of European security and defence policy. It is now being put into practice ‘militarily’ for the first time by an operation according to the rules. It is part of a broader package of political and economic measures in support of the stabilisation process in the region in question. It is therefore important that the requisite publicity be given to the mission. It is after all an important step in the development of a common security policy about which the public should be better informed, by such means as, for instance, the work of this Parliament of ours. I hope that a successful mission will also provide a stimulus to maintaining the necessary tempo in setting up the rapid reaction force and in the development and implementation of a more coordinated arms procurement policy. The resolution rightly focuses considerable attention on the question of democratic legitimacy or rather the absence of it. It is indeed disappointing to learn that in this unique instance Parliament has not really been consulted. This could be better organised in future. The European Parliament is after all one of the European platforms for the monitoring and assessment of such peacekeeping operations.

Political group: PSE