Mr President, my thanks also to the Danish Presidency, the Commission and others. We are facing a kind of evaluation, and the time has come to hand out a little praise, and of course a small amount of criticism, too. First, the praise. I wish to commend the Danish Presidency for managing to secure the release of Akhmed Zakayev before the great Copenhagen Summit gets under way. It was a splendid decision and means that many of my worst fears have fortunately not come true. I also wish to praise the Presidency for its hard work on enlargement. I think, however, that it is worth remembering that praise is also due to the applicant countries for the herculean task of adapting themselves, and for the formidable tasks the populations of these countries have had to undertake in connection with this whole process. I also wish to point out, as Mr Verheugen did, that it is not over yet. Besides the fact that we have not quite completed the whole project, the people of these countries will of course also be voting on whether or not they want to join us. In this connection, it is to be hoped that these voters do not compare the debate on money with the debate we had earlier today, the one about all the money – the large amounts of euros – that, for various reasons, the Commission has not been able to use. I hope that the citizens of the applicant countries do not look at the two things side by side and become frustrated. I hope for a ‘yes’ vote. As regards Turkey, I also agree that the time has not yet come to give that country a date, but I think that the right thing to do would be to give it a date for a date; in other words, set a combination of a timetable and a roadmap. What are the practical demands we are making of them? What are the deadlines? How are they to be met? When must the individual parts of the human rights and democracy projects be implemented in Turkey in order that we can set the final date? It is obvious that it is not possible to give a fixed date right now, with fundamental aspects still not in place and many decisions yet to be implemented. A date for a date, however, would be the right thing to do. There are a couple of things, however, that have disappointed me about the Danish Presidency. I am disappointed that it did not manage to do something about the Statute of the Ombudsman. I am disappointed that it is still not possible for the Ombudsman to obtain the documents he asks for. Not only to be permitted to sit down somewhere and read them, but also to have those documents handed over which he has asked for, and which he needs in order to carry out his work. I am also disappointed that no progress was made towards ensuring that the employees who are in contact with the Ombudsman are only bound by one thing, that is, by the truth, rather than by any form of loyalty to one of the institutions of the EU. These employees must be bound by the truth in order to ensure the proper treatment of citizens within this system, and tackling this was one of Denmark’s clear priorities. I am also disappointed with Denmark’s readiness to cooperate with the USA in connection with the war with Iraq, and also in relation to the EU’s list of terrorist organisations. I should like to hear where the Presidency stands on the plans to put the Iranian resistance movement on the list of terrorist organisations. Does this not conflict with what Denmark, amongst others, supported when the list of terrorist organisations was first discussed, which was that resistance movements comparable with the ANC or the Danish resistance movement must under no circumstances end up on the list of terrorist organisations? We have a problem, and I should like to hear the views of the Danish Presidency on this.

Political group: GUE-NGL