a496: European Union: Declaration on Haiti by the Presidency, on behalf of the European Union (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Robert Benodin <r.benodin@worldnet.att.net>
     on behalf of the European Union

European Union
Brussels, 24 January 2002
5552/02 (Presse 15)
P 7/02
Declaration on Haiti by the Presidency,
on behalf of the European Union

1. In its press release of February 2001 on Haiti, the European Union
expressed its regret that a satisfactory political solution had not been
found in the elections on 21 May 2000 and announced its decision to suspend
partially its financial aid through "appropriate measures" laid down in
Article 96(2)(c) of the Cotonou Agreement.
2. Today, after more than eighteen months of political crisis and various
conciliation and mediation attempts, the Union considers that,
unfortunately, democratic principles are still not upheld in Haiti.
3. The Council of the European Union has therefore decided to review the
measures adopted on 20 January 2001 as "appropriate measures" in accordance
with Article 96(2)(c), as follows: – the appropriate measures taken by the
Council of the EU on 29 January 2001 will be maintained until a basic
agreement has been signed between the two sides in the political crises or,
failing that, until 31 December 2002, – as soon as an agreement between the
two sides is signed, all the cooperation instruments affected by the
measures decided on 29 January 2001 will gradually be reactivated on the
basis of crisis exit indicators, according to the steps set out in the table
in the Annex. These indicators could be adapted, if necessary, on the basis
of developments in both the political and human rights context. These
measures expire on 31 December 2002.
4. The European Union attaches great importance to the ACP-EC Partnership
Agreement. Democratic principles and the rule of law, on which the ACP-EC
partnership is founded, are essential elements of the Agreement and thus
form the cornerstone of EU-Haitian relations.
5. The Union does not wish to penalise the Haitian people and will continue
with cooperation programmes, which are not affected by these measures. It
hopes that the Haitian authorities and all the parties concerned will do
everything they can to achieve these crisis exit steps, thereby enabling all
cooperation instruments to be progressively resumed.
6. The Union will therefore closely follow efforts to achieve a satisfactory
agreement between the two sides to initiate the democratisation process in
Haiti. In this respect, the Union hopes that the OAS mediators can reach a
generally accepted consensus before long. To this end, it is ready to review
its Decision if there are encouraging developments but reserves the right to
take further measures if there is no improvement.
The Central and Eastern European countries associated with the European
Union, the associated countries Cyprus, Malta and Turkey, and the EFTA
countries Iceland and Liechtenstein, members of the European Economic Area
align themselves with this declaration.