The European Parliament adopted a resolution drafted by Angelika BEER (Greens /EFA, DE) amending the proposed regulation establishing an Instrument for Stability. The main amendments were as follows:
1) A number of the amendments were the result of agreements reached between the rapporteur and representatives of the Council during preliminary contacts. (Please see the summary of 25/04/2006) Both sides agreed that the legal basis should not be Article 308 TEC, as originally proposed, but Articles 179 (Development Cooperation) and 181a (Economic, financial and technical cooperation with third countries). This modification would require changes to the scope of the proposal, e.g. all references to measures involving nuclear safety should be deleted as they would be covered by a separate proposal.
2) Parliament also made amendments to Article 1 (general objectives), stating that the specific aims of the Regulation shall be:
-in a situation of crisis or emerging crisis, to contribute to stability by providing an effective response to help preserve, establish or re-establish the conditions essential to the proper implementation of the Community's development and cooperation policies;
-in the context of stable conditions for the implementation of Community cooperation policies in third countries, to help build capacity both to address specific global and transregional threats having a destabilising effect and to ensure preparedness to address pre- and post-crisis situations.
3) Parliament made further radical changes restructuring the text of the proposal:
-provisions on complementarity of Community assistance are grouped under one article;
- provisions on assistance in response to situations of crisis or emerging crisis are grouped together in one article;
- provisions on assistance in the context of stable conditions for co-operation are grouped together under one article.
4) Community assistance under the Regulation will be implementedthrough the following measures:
- Exceptional Assistance Measures and Interim Response Programmes;
- multi-country Strategy papers, Multi-annual Indicative Programmes and Thematic Strategy Papers;
- annual Action Programmes;
- special measures.
There are detailed provisions on all four of the above measures.
5) Parliament has deleted debt-relief as a form of Community financing.
6) The financial envelope for implementation of the Regulation over the period 2007-2013 is EUR 2 062 000 000. Annual appropriations shall be authorised by the budgetary authority within the limits of the financial framework. Parliament has added ceilings on the amount that can be allocated under certain headings.
7) The Commission shall submit by 31 December 2010 (rather than 2011), a report evaluating the implementation of the Regulation in the first three years, if appropriate with a legislative proposal introducing the necessary modifications to the instrument