Speech by Mr. Indulis Berzins,
the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Latvia,
Enlargement Seminar in Stockholm
September 28, 2000
Chairman,
Minister,
Your Excellencies,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
First of all, I would like to thank my colleague, Minister Anna Lindh, for the opportunity to be here and to address this distinguished audience on the subject of a crucial importance for all of us.
When I think about the enlargement process the words of writer Antoine de Saint-Exupeiry come to my mind. He told the following: "You became responsible, forever, for what you have tamed". All the candidate countries have to prepare themselves for the enlargement. And this is a huge responsibility. Latvia acknowledges its responsibility to be equal among equals. The member states encourage us in this process and it is a big responsibility for them. They are responsible for the process as a whole.
Within less than four months Sweden will take the helm of the European Union for the first time. The top priority of the Swedish presidency will be the enlargement of the European Union. A real "breakthrough" with the most advanced candidate countries, who started the negotiations after Helsinki has been made already in Feira by the decision to open negotiations in all areas of the acquis with them as early as possible in 2001. We hope that the year 2001 will come with the fulfillment of the decisions of the Helsinki and Feira EU Councils.
1. Enlargement process
Latvia is satisfied with the pace of the enlargement process this far. Helsinki formally ended the political division of the candidates into groups. All the candidate countries have to be given an equal chance to catch up. There are two preconditions for this: opening of all the remaining negotiating chapters as early as possible next year and each candidate country's preparedness. This will allow to reach ?the point of no return? with regard to the discriminating division of candidates, which is no longer valid today.
Nobody will have to wait for Latvia. We are prepared to be among the first in the Central and Eastern Europe to join the EU. Position papers in practically all the negotiation chapters, including Agriculture, Justice and Home Affairs and Environment, will be submitted by Latvia to the European Commission by the end of the French presidency. We expect that an early agreement regarding the Institutions and the Financial and Budgetary Provision chapters will be reached among the EU members.
Individual approach is crucial, especially in the elaboration of the EU negotiating positions. Application of the same negotiating positions towards all the candidates may produce ill- fated results. Agricultural sector in the Baltic States constitutes a considerably smaller share of the GDP than in some bigger candidate countries, or let us take another example - free movement of persons the Baltic States will never cause problems in this area.
Latvia is in an advantageous situation we have had the possibility to learn both from the experience and mistakes of other candidate countries. This has allowed Latvia to be better prepared upon the start of the accession negotiations.
The healthy competition among candidate countries is motivating and this does not exclude cooperation among them. Because this is also the responsibility of the candidate countries to speed up the whole process. On the grounds of a comparable situation in many areas there is a pressing need for a regular exchange of information among the candidate countries, in particular those which are close neighbours. Consultations and coordination of the position papers allow to learn more about the EU position in every concrete chapter, as well as to avoid unwelcome consequences in the negotiations. This is particularly important in such areas as taxation and transport.
We are an integral part of Europe. Consequently, we can assure that democracy and market economy are well functioning in Latvia. The trade turnover of Latvia with the European Union has reached two thirds during the first six months of this year. EU-Latvia's trade has been almost liberalized.
We work to promote the strengthening of our integration into the EU in all areas:
The increase of gross domestic product (GDP) has reached 5.1 per cent during the first half of this year.
The inflation rate in Latvia has been one of the lowest among the Central and Eastern European Countries, and the unemployment has gone down to 8.1 per cent.
Latvia takes the fourth place among the Central and Eastern European Countries in terms of volume of investment per capita.
Latvia and their neighbours Lithuania and Estonia maintain noteworthy potentials for the development of the information technology sector. Already today more than 120 thousand qualified information technology experts are working in the Baltic States. Experts believe this will build grounds for the Baltic States to find their place within the world's leading exporters of software services. The cooperation with our North European partners in this area has a big potential.
In economic terms, the Baltic Sea has became for the EU a mare nostrum - the new growth region:
considerable investment flows across the Baltic Sea; the Scandinavian and German presence is strong
development of a common infrastructure of gas, energy, telecommunication networks, railways and motorways, e-links
we are witnessing a progressive creation of a common legal environment, including internal market regulations
skilled workforce at competitive price
strategic location between European and CIS markets
Our main task is to ensure that this growth is sustainable and well balanced across the whole region. A lot remains to be done. Western part is still dominating, but there is a huge potential in the Eastern part.
After the accession the relationship between the EU and Russia will also enter into a qualitatively new stage. The forms and framework of the EU cooperation in the areas of strategic importance for the Baltic Sea region like environment, combating the organized crime, competition (market economy) can be used as a model for Russia. Copenhagen criteria could serve as a benchmark for the assessment of Russia's economic (internal) reforms. I am an optimist, but just cautious, because the crucial precondition is Russia's willingness to cooperate.
2. Every candidate's responsibility for complying with its own commitments.
The Helsinki Council has set the EU's internal target date to be prepared for the acceptance of the first new Member States on 1 January 2003. Parallel to this, all the candidate states have set their own internal target dates. Compliance with the internal target dates is each one's own responsibility. So is the maintenance of the pace and quality of reforms.
Latvia aims at completing the accession negotiations by the end of 2002 at the latest.
We stress as well the responsibility of the Member States in the context of the negotiation talks to taking early political positions on chapters like free movement of persons, agriculture, environment.
3. Bringing the enlargement process closer to the citizens
Negotiations and accession are matters of confidence. We have noticed the rising skepticism among the people of the EU Member States. It seems to me that candidates are often much more eager and thus successful in re-discovering the Western Europe, than the people of the Western Europe in getting acquainted with the candidates. Hopefully, the physical line in the map of Europe erased in 1989 will not grow into a mental wall in the minds of people.
The people of the Baltic States are lucky to have such enthusiastic and supportive neighbours as the Nordic EU Member States. We experience this support on daily basis, in very practical terms. The question is how to give a new impetus for the EU as a whole to accept the enlargement as the priority of the EU citizens.
The EU citizens should be aware that there is no way back once a half-way has been tracked. The European Union has invested enormous resources in the enlargement project. Let me compare this with a business plan the investment has to bring profit. Accomplishment of this project will bring stability and development. The whole European Union's capacity to compete on a global scale depends largely on the success of this project.
My attention was attracted by the recent public polls in the EU member states and candidate countries. In Latvia public support for our accession to the EU is growing. We in Latvia are paying and will continue to pay much more attention to the raising of the public awareness about the involvement into the EU integration process, as we consider public support as a basis for the EU integration policy implemented by the government.
4. IGC results should not lead to inequalities among Member States
I would like to revive the story which has been mentioned recently by our Prime Minister at the economic forum in Malmo. A legend about Riga City tells that in ancient days the devil wanted to flood the city, but the citizens managed to convince the devil not to do it before the construction of Riga would have been accomplished. Time by time devil sneaks out of the Daugava River to ask people whether the city of Riga is ready. He always gets the same answer that the construction of Riga has not yet been accomplished.
Just so the European Union is not yet ready. I believe, it will always be in a continuous process of development. Discussions about the future perspectives of Europe and the Baltic Sea Region are an integral part of this.
The IGC indicates that the EU we will enter will be completely different from the one we are acceding to now. We have no doubt that an agreement on the most urgent reforms should be reached before the enlargement. However, the EU should wait for us to discuss more fundamental reforms (Constitution, Parliament), so that we can shape the future of the EU together.
With regard to the current IGC, we see the purpose of the EU institutional reform as that of insurance of the principles of equal treatment and non-discrimination.
As we cannot participate in this IGC directly, we rely on the Nordic EU Member States to represent also our interests.
I have to admit that I feel true satisfaction when I see our guests being surprised, perhaps even a little shocked, as they instead of a fancied typical post-soviet dullness discover a Western European style city of Riga teeming with pearls of art nouveau. Riga with its multinational and multi-confessional features is a value to the European Union.
The Baltic Sea is truly becoming an internal "lake" of the European Union. It is an essential moment in history. The supreme mission of all of us is to strive for the Baltic Sea Region to become the most dynamic region in Europe. I am confident we will manage to achieve this.
Thank you for your attention.
(End of text)
