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| Regions - European Institutions | |
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MEPs raid EU Asian aid budget It may have been conducted in broad daylight by illustrious and perhaps honourable persons, but the action perpetrated in the European Parliament at its November session seemed more akin to a hijacking. By vote recorded as being 334 in favour, 159 against and 24 abstentions, the Parliament seemed engulfed in an intercontinental clash, which resulted in a raid on behalf Latin America and to the disadvange of unsuspecting Asians. The operation was carried out on the EU budget proposal presented by the European Commission for financial allocations for cooperation and development programmes in Latin America and Asia, which in the past have been considered jointly. In its wisdom, the Parliament decided to separate the two so that the two budgets could be considered independently for each region, which has a certain logic, although External Affairs Commissioner Chris Patten was reported to have argued there was "no convincing argument," in favour.But then the MEPs and lobbyists maurauded the budget, which had foreseen an allocation of some 34% for Latin America and 66% for Asia in some proportion to the population ratio of the regions and the unfortunate ratio of poverty in Asia, an increase of some 42% for aid to Asia and a reduction of 5% in assistance for Latin America. This shift in Commission priorities had been in part stimulated by the appeals by the British NGO BOND and others in 2002 noting the disproportion in the feable amount of EU aid to Asia in relation the population and poverty there. The MEPs instead transferred 250 million euros originally proposed for Asia for the years 2003 to 2006 to Latin America and voted also for creation a special Regional Fund, also opposed by Commissioner Patten. The actions left various NGOs, MEPs interested in Asia and others furious and aghast at the audacity of their colleagues. Some NGO representatives suggested a lobbying campaign should be launched to reverse the decision and one EU official indicated that the vote could still be overturned in the Parliament's second reading of the budget later in the year. |
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