Jean-Claude Mignon, President of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), and Štefan Füle, European Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighbourhood Policy, issued today the following statement, on the occasion of Commissioner Füle's visit to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe :

"Our close and joint cooperation and engagement with our partners in the East and in the Southern neighbourhood represents a powerful instrument to support their process of transformation and the development of deep rooted democracy. Our co-operation is part of a well-defined strategy and the European Union-Council of Europe joint programmes provide the countries with real support and practical, visible results.

In order to boost the impact of our action still further, we wish to expand the parliamentary side of our joint assistance and co-operation programmes, focusing in particular on increasing the capacity of national parliaments in the areas of drafting legislation and developing the skills of parliamentary staff, as well as the establishment of parliamentary procedures which fully respect political pluralism in parliaments. (more...)

Video of the press conference
Video of the speech
Speech

See also: The Council of Europe and the European Union: different roles, shared values