Istvan SERTÖ-RADICS to chair the CoR's RELEX commission

COR/08/45

Brussels, 26 February.2008

Istvan SERTÖ-RADICS to chair the CoR's RELEX commission

Istvan SERTÖ-RADICS, who is also Mayor of the Hungarian city of Uszka and member of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE), has been elected chairman of the CoR's Commission for External Relations and Decentralised Cooperation (RELEX commission). His term of office, which follows on from that of Uno ALDEGREN, President of the Skåne Regional Council (SE/PES), will run for the next two years.

Istvan SERTÖ-RADICS will now take on the task of directing the commission's work. Having served as First Vice-Chairman of the RELEX commission since 2006, he is already familiar with the issues covered by its remit. He was, for example, rapporteur for the own-initiative opinion on Local and Regional Government in Ukraine and the Development of Cooperation Between the EU and Ukraine, adopted by the CoR's plenary session in October 2007.

In his first statement as commission chairman, Mr SERTÖ-RADICS congratulated the outgoing chairman on the work he had accomplished, stressing his contribution to moving the commission's work forward, particularly on the stabilisation of the Western Balkans, the neighbourhood policy and the strategic partnership with Russia. He then went on to say that, "The CoR has an important role to play in the EU's relationship with non-member countries: whilst cooperation between regions is crucial to sustainable development and social cohesion, links between regions can also be links between countries".

He will be assisted in his duties by Ian MICALLEFF (MT/EPP), the Mayor of Gzira and member of the European People's Party, who was elected First Vice-Chairman, and the Second Vice-Chairman, Paul O'DONOGHUE (IE/UEN-EA), a member of Kerry County Council and President of the Union for Europe of the Nations and the European Free Alliance Group at the CoR.

In addition to these appointments, the meeting on 25 February was also intended to prepare the commission's future work ahead of the CoR Plenary Session in April 2008. In this regard, the members of the RELEX commission had an opportunity to exchange views on issues relating to the 2007 enlargement package. The commission discussed and then adopted two draft opinions: the first, whose rapporteur was Alin Nica (RO/ALDE), Mayor of Dudeştii Noi, on the candidate countries and the second, presented by Martin HEATLEY (UK/EPP), Member of Warwickshire County Council, on the pre-candidate countries.

The other discussion items on the agenda were a communication from the European Commission on the European neighbourhood policy, the draft opinion presented by Gabor BIHARY, Member of the Budapest General Assembly (HU/PES), and a communication from the European Commission on the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR) Strategy Paper 2007-2010, for which the draft opinion was presented by Heini Utunen-Ziv (FI, ALDE), Member of the City Council of Jyväskylä.

In general terms, the remit of the RELEX commission extends to enlargement, the neighbourhood policy, decentralised cooperation, and issues relating to the Nordic dimension, the Euro-Mediterranean process and the Balkans. Commission meetings are intended to improve the draft opinions presented by rapporteurs, by enabling them to take account of the full spectrum of commission members' opinions and feelings.

The current president of the Committee of the Regions (CoR), the European institution whose task is to give regions and local authorities a say in the EU's decision-making process, is Luc VAN den BRANDE.

The webpage of the RELEX commission

The report CdR 34/2007 fin

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