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Budget Crisis in EU, Blair Satisfies Nobody |
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Saturday, 3 December 2005The European Union budget of 2007-2013, causing to conclude the June Summit in failure, now seems to cause trouble for the term President UK.
Strong French opposition to the re-opening of discussions on the Common Agriculture Policy (CAP) fund from which they take a big lump of share, and the UK's refusal to discuss the rebate in contribution to the EU budget it obtained in 1984 put the Union in a deadlock.
Relatively poorer new members as of 1 May 2004 want the problem to be resolved at once and EU funds to be opened to use.
The new proposals by the Term President UK's Prime Minister, Tony Blair, who began to tour Europe less than two weeks left to the EU summit, was attacked by both the British and other Europeans.
On Friday, Blair signaled a discount between 12-15 percent from the yearly rebate worth of 5.6 billion euros might be acceptable. In return, he is expected to suggest a discount in CAP as well.
Britain will reportedly suggest a 10 percent (16 billion euros) cut in subsidy transfer to new members to be opened to discussions. These members can say "yes" to a smaller discount in exchange for making use of the funds easily, it has been reported.
Guillaume Durand from the European Policy Center (EPC) based in Brussels assessing the budget crisis to Zaman Daily pointed out even the "little" Luxembourg, the previous term president, worked more on the budget than the UK. "There are still no budget figures," he said, "They will reach the members on Monday I think. This is too late, there is less than two weeks left to the summit."
Durand also warned about the possibility of not reaching an agreement on the budget in the summit, assessing however that it would not be a "disaster." The issue on the budget can be left to Austria, the next term president. "UK acts on the issue of the budget like a country that defends its own benefits, not like an EU term president."
Zaman, 3 Dec 2005 |
Saturday, 3 December 2005
European Union Budget
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