Today's Date:

You are right to say that while the Barcelona Process, launched in November 1995, has enabled the creation of a common area between the European Union and the countries of the southern Mediterranean shore, it isn’t allowing us to make sufficient progress today.

This is the objective of the Barcelona Summit on 28 and 29 November, a summit of heads of State and government. There are three challenges:

The first is economic. Going beyond the 11 association contracts linking the European Union with our southern partners, I think the time has come to create a financial mechanism. Why not, in fact, have a Euro-Mediterranean investment bank so that we could help our partners carry out political reforms and liberalize their economies?

The second challenge is political: to share the same vision of the fight against terrorism – the 35 countries with the same vision of the fight against terrorism should adopt a code of conduct in Barcelona – and, of course, carry out political reforms to further democracy.

Lastly, I shall conclude with the third and final challenge: immigration. We’ll succeed here only by understanding that the Maghreb countries are today just transit countries, that we need to deal with the security problems, getting coastguards to work together and pooling our policies on combating illegal immigration, and, finally, that the problem won’t be resolved through a solely security-oriented approach, but also requires a generous, responsible policy vis-à-vis the countries of sub-Saharan Africa, particularly as regards co-development.

For more information about the Euro-Mediterranean partnership