Mr President, Minister, Commissioner Patten, at the start of the 1990s I had the pleasure of participating in a programme of cooperation between a group of Russian democratic forces and one of European non- parties. There were just 25 of us in all, and our chairman was the current French President, Jacques Chirac. We adopted the slogan ‘There is no great Russia without Europe, and no great Europe without Russia’ for it. This is becoming ever truer today with enlargement of the European Union to the east and Russia becoming a compass point, from the Union’s point of view, where most of our opportunities for economic cooperation lie, although there are also numerous, not to say countless, obstacles for us to overcome. Along with such issues as organised crime, human trafficking and drug routes, these obstacles still constitute a regional threat, even though the security threat may have receded. The Northern Dimension naturally means cooperation between all the countries in the region: Germany, Poland and the Baltic countries, as well as Finland, Sweden and countries even further away, in such areas as environmental hazards, nuclear safety, infrastructure and the prevention of infectious diseases. Our most crucial problem, however, is making Russia an integral part of this work. Despite the length of Commissioner Patten’s praiseworthy list of achievements it would also be easy to criticise the Commission and the Council for an inadequate show of initiative regarding the Northern Dimension, but the fact is that the problems are not mainly due to us, but to Russia’s attitude. Nevertheless, as we heard, for the Union the notion of the Northern Dimension has been a tool to shape strategy. At street level President Putin has not yet succeeded in his aim to make Russia a state subject to the rule of law, a ‘dictatorship of law’ as he put it; instead, corruption, crime, and totally unpredictable behaviour on the part of the administration still do more to prevent cooperation at public, business and Union level than Russia’s inadequate economic resources ever could. It is for that very reason, however, that, while the next Northern Dimension Action Plan is in force over the period 2004–2006, we should work hard to increase political activity in that direction to reassure the Russians that cooperation between us is advantageous to both parties, although it is definitely more important for them than it is for us. The Commission will have several new members in 2004. I still think it is worth considering that one of them should focus on developing cooperation with our neighbours Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and the Mediterranean regions. This would be practical work that would not, Commissioner Patten, be in competition with the large-scale foreign policies laid down by others in the Commission or the Council. We in Parliament too, as the Commissioner said, can and must be active in new ways, when the focus of attention turns from enlargement to our immediate neighbours. The importance of the existing delegations from these countries is growing, and they must become more active. Ladies and gentlemen, in all honesty how many of us are familiar with conditions in rural and border regions in Northwest Russia or Ukraine? Our path has mainly led to the big cities and the administrative authorities. African and Asian questions are important, and we in the North also understand that, but from the viewpoint of a Europe our children will inherit, the most important direction in which we should be looking is nevertheless the country next door to us and the one offering great opportunities, Russia. My experience is obviously based on neighbouring region cooperation between Finland and Russia, but I think that the freely operative NGOs, also referred to in Parliament’s motion for a resolution, in Finland are already doing at least as much good work, for example, in patching up Russia’s non-existent social security system, as the authorities and the state in their own work. Our job is to encourage and assist them. I would like to thank the Commission for its report and also its ideas for the future. I believe that we have done a lot of the foundation work since 1999 with a view to getting Russia still more actively involved. The idea in Parliament’s joint motion for a resolution, which I will not otherwise be quoting from, regarding looking into appropriations or making them available in the budget, must be supported, particularly because we are all excited about the long-term ideas and the long-term programme. The size of the appropriation and whether it increases will then depend more on our partners in Russia and in other countries in the neighbouring regions than on us. Mr President, I hope that it was not symbolic when the representative of the Council, the Greek minister, the Chamber when we began discussing the Northern Dimension. I really do hope that Greece and Italy, in whose programme there is no mention of the Northern Dimension at all, will also take the Northern Dimension into consideration. After all, we in the Nordic countries also understand the importance of the Barcelona Process and the Mediterranean Partnership.

Political group: PPE-DE