Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, please excuse my late arrival, but this other political issue is still on the agenda today, more is the pity. The Committee on Foreign Affairs, Human Rights, Common Security and Defence Policy would advise you to release the EUR 35 million, and this piece of advice is given because this money can truly benefit those in need. The things that have given us cause for criticism are not so serious as to stop us wanting to help the people there. However, this does not mean that we will forget the criticism in the process. Of course we would be a lot further on in our procedure if the Council administration had not forgotten to inform the European Parliament in good time and to provide it with official documents. Only then would we have been able to conduct proper and searching discussions. I urge the administration to see to it that this does not happen in future. It is only because there are people in need that we are prepared to overlook this. However, we must be sure to introduce certain conditions here. One condition is that money should be given to those who will make sensible use of it and not to those who might use it for pursuing other aims. In other words, we should ensure that the money falls to Mr Kouchner’s sphere of competence and not to other spheres. Secondly, even if the Commission and the Council adopt a different position on this because they see real problems there, we believe that the other donors must also fulfil the obligations they have entered into. This mission is being conducted under the auspices of the United Nations and we cannot have a situation where the European Union is the only one to fulfil its obligations. It is no less incumbent on the other donor countries to fulfil their obligations within this timeframe, in the interests of the persons affected. This brings me onto the point that in future we are going to have to concern ourselves much more intensively with this issue in general terms, that is to say, not just with this specific project but with overall developments in south-east Europe, and with the aid delivered there. This is another example of the fact that the European Union is prepared to help and to give money but the political leadership lacks coherence. We have so many coordinators, who, in turn, are responsible to so many employers, that we will soon have to employ a coordinator for the coordinators. Perhaps it would be better, however, if the positions of responsibility within the European Union and the other institutions from the OSCE to the United Nations, were to get together some time to introduce a uniform, coordinated procedure and to examine how we can be of real assistance to the people there. I know that the Commission is thinking seriously about how to achieve this, but if the European Union is doing the most work out there, then it should also be given the leadership, and bring coherence to the situation, so that we can be of real assistance to the people. It makes no sense at all for the various international institutions and associations to be engaged in competition amongst themselves rather than investing all their energies in helping the people on the ground! Bearing in mind that the conference of donors for the stability pact is constantly being postponed – it is now set for the end of March – that no one knows which projects are actually in the pipeline, that one cannot tell how things can actually be implemented, and there is a steady stream of new press conferences, this does not appear to be the way to restore peace and reconciliation amongst peoples to this region of Europe! Accordingly, we would like to take this opportunity to urge the Commission and Council Presidency to seize this political initiative, so as to avoid us landing in such a desperate situation again and having to restore our solvency at the end of a month. Rather, we must use this initiative to establish a long-term aid strategy for this country, and I hope that in the process, you will fulfil your political obligations at long last and not allow things to continue as they have been doing for the past few months.

Political group: PPE-DE