Cooperation with the European Commission on the next Multiannual Financial Framework, EU strategy on islands and the ‘Right to Stay’ initiative were the main issues discussed during a meeting on Thursday between the President of the Republic, Nikos Christodoulides, and the European Commission Executive Vice-President for Cohesion and Reforms, Raffaele Fitto, who will deliver a speech on EU strategy on islands in the context of the High-level conference “Strengthening islands and coastal communities of the European Union” held on Friday in Pafos.
Welcoming Raffaele Fitto at the Presidential Palace, President Christodoulides thanked him for his support during the Cyprus Presidency of the Council of the EU.
‘What you did for our presidency was very decisive, especially with regard to the biggest and most important file, the Multiannual Financial Framework, and I wanted publicly to thank you for your leadership, for your support’ the President said.
‘We are very glad to have you in Cyprus for this very important conference, it is a very important one, and I am sure that our cooperation will continue also after the presidency’, he added.
For his part, the EC Executive Vice-President said that a very important work has been done for the next MFF, for the governance of the next national regional partnership, ‘a very important step for the future and also for the strategy for islands.’
‘I think that was another important work that we concluded during your presidency. I can say that this presidency was a very important success for you and for the European Commission, and we can continue to work together on this experience. It was a great pleasure also for the next step, for the next MFF, but also for the next proposals that we are preparing, starting from the Right To Stay, this is another important issue’, he noted.
He added he will be visiting a number of villages in the country, ‘because the message is to go on the ground, to visit the situation also, to prepare this new strategy also, to give a very important and right answer to these needs that we have on this important dossier.” “I can imagine that it will be possible to continue to work together, to collaborate very well’, he concluded.
In his statements after the meeting, Fitto said that it was an important occasion to verify the work that the Cyprus Presidency has made. ‘I think that it was a very important work and we achieved very important results’, he added.
‘At the same time, for me, this is an important occasion also to present the Strategy for Islands. The Strategy for Islands was an important new approach of the European Commission. We worked very well, we have 17 million people that live in the islands and the message that we want to give is that this is an important tool for the future, in particular also to use better the new approach of the new European budget, the next MFF. We have the opportunity also to use the resources with this strategy and also to face the big challenge of the cost of insularity. Now we have to continue our work with the government to achieve these very important results’, he noted.
Asked about his visit today to Ayios Ioannis village in Limassol District, followed by a visit to Troodos Observatory, an EU funded project, as part of ‘Right To Stay’ initiative, the EC Executive Vice-President said that this is another important dossier.
‘The Right To Stay is a crucial issue for the future of Europe. We have the goal to give more competitiveness to Europe, but at the same time we have an important risk on the depopulation of the internal rural areas and the remote areas’, he continued.
‘Today I am visiting these villages and this is the new approach that we are having because the idea is to prepare this strategy for the Right To Stay, to create also an integrated policy between the region and the other policies like agriculture, fisheries, transport, tourism, this is the idea that we want to have. Also, in the last weeks we presented this call for evidence and we received more than 700 contributions. I think it is a very important message that there is a great interest in this way and now we are working because we will present this strategy in the first months of the next year’, he further explained.
‘But in all my missions I am visiting these villages because the idea is also to see directly on the ground to understand better the real needs that these territories have’, he concluded.