Mediterranean Programme - [12/01/2007]

CIDOB at From the Barcelona Process to the Mediterranean Union?

Speaking at a seminar in Barcelona, the Coordinator of the CIDOB Foundation's Mediterranean Programme, Eduard Soler, highlighted some of the oversights in the proposal by French President Nicolas Sarkozy to establish a Mediterranean Union. Together with Laia Carbonell, Research Assistant to the CIDOB Foundation's Mediterranean Programme, Soler was taking part in From the Barcelona Process to the Mediterranean Union?, a seminar organised by the Rafael Campalans Foundation and the Friedrich Ebert Foundation.Soler pointed out some of the oversights existing in the Mediterranean Union, such as social issues, open and latent conflicts, and issues concerning democratisation, human rights and mobility. The Coordinator of the CIDOB Foundation's Mediterranean Programme explained that while it was a laudable idea that the French proposal should attempt to act on specific projects, it might make the mistake of falling out of sync with European external policy if some of the aforementioned issues are overlooked, or if they are dealt with in a way that is diametrically opposed to the principles governing the EU's external action.

The French diplomat Jacques Hutzinger, who presented the proposal for the Mediterranean Union, claimed that while the Union was not an attempt to supplant the Barcelona Process, it was aimed at superseding some of its limits, to constitute a form of strengthened cooperation that would make it easier to work on the basis of specific projects and strengthened political dialogue.

Fidel Sendagorta, Ambassador in Special Mission for Mediterranean Affairs of Spain's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Senén Florensa, Director of the European Institute of the Mediterranean (IEMed), stressed that the French proposal should not substitute Euro-Mediterranean partnership, but rather it should strengthen it with its efforts.

On the second day of the seminar, Raimón Obiols, Euro MP, Fátima Aburto, Member of the Spanish Parliament and Alain Chenal, from the Jean Jaurés Foundation, presented different socialist perspectives on Euro-Mediterranean cooperation.

Nicolas Sarkozy's proposal, which he had initially announced in the electoral campaign in Toulon and went on to outline in greater detail in his speech in Tangier in October 2007, became the central issue for debate at the seminar. However, most of the seminar's participants expressed reservations over different points of the initiative. Participants at the event included Pau Solanilla, Mediterranean Coordinator of the Rafael Campalans Foundation, Paqui Santonja, Head of Euro-Mediterranean cooperation at Barcelona Provincial Council and Toni Comín and Mohamed Chaïb, Members of the Parliament of Catalonia.