The presidency of Portugal in the Council of the European Union, which takes place throughout the semester that started on January 1 and lasts until June 30, 2021, has concluded one of its most decisive missions: to carry out good port negotiations on the European Regional Development Fund and the Cohesion Fund. The talks, initiated by Germany last December, have resulted in the approval of a global amount of 240,000 million euros to make investments within the EU during the period between the current year and 2027.
It is one of the main financial assets that stand out in the promotion of Community cohesion policy because it aims to smooth out the development differences between European regions, that is, to reduce the imbalances between the most developed and the least favored.Get the most of it,The Cohesion Fund, which has become a reality since 1994, applies to “trans-European relations of member states with a per capita gross national income lower than 90% of the national average. The Portuguese presidential semester is marked by the consequences of the coronavirus pandemic, this a country that has gone from more to less in its management of the health crisis.
Another of the central aspects lies in opening the doors to hope thanks to the agreement to distribute the vaccine in the 27 member countries of this EU, it lends itself to approaching its relations with the United Kingdom from a different perspective, once Brexit has taken hold. arrived. The vaccination strategy is distinguished, therefore, as one of the great priorities in the community agenda that Lisbon will promote, on the way to achieve “the true union for health”, according to the statements of the Portuguese Minister of Foreign Affairs, Augusto Santos Silva. Vaccination Applying the appropriate criteria so that the process of immunization of European citizens continues to take its course becomes a matter of the first order if Europe wishes to see the light at the end of the tunnel.
“If this massive vaccination strategy is satisfactory, and has all the conditions for it to be, it will be a qualitative leap in the way in which we can respond to the health crisis and the economic and social consequences,” explained the Minister of Foreign Affairs Portuguese, Augusto Santos Silva.
It is also up to Portugal to take the reins that make it possible to make the most of the distribution of European recovery funds, vital for the approval of the different General Budgets to find that necessary plus destined to re-grease the business fabric of Finland to Malta and from Denmark to Greece. The leading role of Portugal within the Union comes after the recent presidential elections were held, controversial because they were carried out in the current health context, but which allowed us to continue betting on political cohabitation. Because, in effect, the conservative Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa was re-elected by a wide margin of advantage and then now this semester of preponderance in Brussels materializes with renewed political stability since the Portuguese have not hesitated to redouble their confidence in him so that compensates for the legislative work of the socialist government.
The keys to the new framework for relations with the United Kingdom also gained prominence, given that commercial ins and outs will gradually experience a surprising regression concerning the situation that was considered current until December 31.
Precisely, there the disease will return to the foreground, as the covid-19 has crept into the agenda of every one of the meetings sheltered from Brussels without warning, the vast majority in a virtual format. Furthermore, it is up to Portugal to accelerate the relocation of EU influence across the globe. Europe has to look in all the directions of the world”, which is the slogan of the Portuguese presidency. A concept that the neighboring country must strive to avoid stagnating.
Along the same lines, Santos Silva stated, Precisely, what is intended is for Europe to be able to speak with the United States, the United Kingdom, Latin America, and Africa, while not neglecting that in Asia it must be able to speak to the same time with China, with Japan, with India or with the Southeast of that continent. It is, consequently, a sample button of the open-minded prism that Portugal intends to impart under his mandate, leaving behind the differences expressed concerning the ‘premier’ Boris Johnson, always controversial but who must be recognized as the great architect of the plan mass vaccination against the coronavirus has spread much earlier than in Germany or France, to name just two examples.
