The 16th meeting of the Parliamentary Committee on the European Union-Moldova Association is taking place in Brussels. The participants plan to adopt a declaration on accelerating negotiations on Moldova’s accession to the EU, and are also discussing a financial assistance package worth €1.9 billion.
The Moldovan delegation is headed by the Chairman of the Commission on European Integration, Marcel Spatar. The delegation also included deputies from the PAS party and the opposition.
Member of the European Parliament from Romania Siegfried Muresan said that the prepared document provides for a transition to a new stage of negotiations.
“Today the committee will adopt a declaration that we have been working on in recent weeks. We encourage you to build on the results achieved. It is necessary to start negotiations not only at the technical level on clusters, but also at the political level – in all directions,” the deputy said.
According to him, the goal is to begin negotiations at the political level as soon as possible, ideally before the end of the year.
“We want to open negotiations on the first cluster by the end of June, and on all the others by the end of the year,” Muresan specified.
The second important issue of the meeting concerns the financial support that the European Union provides to Moldova.
“We will discuss an aid package worth €1.9 billion. Moldova already received about €300 million last summer, then two more tranches – almost €500 million in total. The assessment of the European Parliament and the European Commission shows that they are implementing projects very well,” the MEP emphasized.
At the same time, he noted that the European authorities intend to provide additional support for the effective use of funds.
“We want to help Moldova prepare high-quality projects so that funds are disbursed without delays,” Muresan added.
Muresan also announced plans for the new EU budget for 2028–2034.
“The European Parliament supports an increase in the budget by about 10% and an increase in funding for candidate countries by 12%,” the MEP said.
According to him, it is important to designate specific amounts for each candidate country.
“Every candidate country needs predictability. Citizens of Moldova must clearly understand how much money they can count on if they continue the European course,” Muresan explained.
The funds are planned to be used for infrastructure projects, community development and media support.
In addition, the European Parliament proposes to review the budget in the event of EU expansion.
“If there is an expansion between 2028 and 2034, we want an immediate review of the budget. New EU member states, including Moldova, must gain access to funds as quickly as possible,” concluded Muresan.
Let us recall that Moldova received the status of a candidate country for accession to the European Union in June 2022, and two years later officially began accession negotiations.
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