BRATISLAVA, October 1, (WEBNOVINY) — The prime ministers of nine EU member states and Croatia that should join the EU next year, will meet in Bratislava on Friday to jointly speak out against a reduction of the EU budget for the seven-year period from 2014 to 2020. Six other countries will be represented at this meeting of prime ministers of some EU member states within the informal group called Friends of Cohesion, by cabinet ministers and state secretaries. The event in Bratislava should also be attended by the President of the European Commission Jose Manuel Barroso and the President of the European Parliament Martin Schulz, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico informed at a news conference on Monday.
„I can confirm that present at the Friends of Cohesion meeting on Friday will be prime ministers of the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Romania, Bulgaria, Slovenia, Croatia,“ said Prime Minister Fico. Representatives of fifteen countries want to sign a joint declaration calling on the European Commission to mobilize all the instruments supporting economic growth. „I believe that the voice that will come from Slovakia on Friday it will be important, it will be the voice of fifteen, sixteen countries have the same opinion, and if supported by the European Commission and the European Parliament, this can significantly influence the final shape of the EU budget for 2014 -2020,“ said Fico.
The prime minister pointed out that Slovakia draws a lot of money from EU funds, so we should care about how the next EU budget will look like. „In past years, up to 76 percent of all public investment in Slovakia was financed from EU funds,“ he said. In the question of the next budget, the EU is now divided to countries that are net payers and demand a reduction of the budget, and to countries that maintain that the budget is well balanced, as it is proposed by the European Commission. According to Fico, the net payers further argue that if the budget is to be reduced, then especially at the expense of cohesion policy, i.e., a policy of mitigating disparities between EU regions. The Friends of Cohesion meeting in Bratislava will specifically speak out against this.
The informal group of Friends of Cohesion consists of fifteen EU member states: Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain. Croatia’s accession to the EU is expected on July 1, 2013 after ratification of the Accession Treaty by all members of the European Union.
SITA