Speaking in the seminar “Regional Cooperation for regional growth” in Murmansk last week, EU Commission representative Fernando Garces highlighted that the EU’s Communication on the Arctic from last year is a step in the process of making a comprehensive EU Arctic Policy.
The EU has a lot to contribute with in the Arctic, he underlined, and added that it is about time that the Commission gets permanent observer status in the Arctic Council. As BarentsObserver has reported, the Arctic Council has so far turned down the Commission’s request for higher status
In his presentation, the commission representative also said that cross-border relations in the northernmost parts of Europe have a positive and pragmatic approach. As a matter of fact, cross-border relations in the High North can serve as a model for EU-Russia cooperation, the EU Commission representative maintained.
-The further north, the better East-West relations, Garces said, admitting that other European regions should learn from the northerners.
The Commission representative praised cooperation within the frames of Northern Dimension, the EU’s main cooperation instrument in the northernmost parts of Europe. He stressed that it has been a success to include Russia and Norway on equal terms in the Northern Dimension policy from 2006. He also said that he is happy to see current Russian progress in the signing of the joint EU-Russia CBC ENPI programmes – programmes which will become the backbone for East-West project cooperation in Europe.
Mr. Garces, a representative of DG Relex, the EU’s foreign affairs body, had been invited to Murmansk by the North Norway, North Finland and North Sweden EU offices in Brussels, as well as the Norwegian Barents Secretariat.
