EU BUDGET: PARLIAMENT LOOKS FOR REVISION OF FINANCIAL PERSPECTIVE.

The rapporteur for the Budget 2000 knows exactly where he wants to go with this. In June, even before July's Budget Council, Jean-Louis Bourlanges said the medium-term financial perspective would have to be revised to take account of expenditure outside the European Union. The milestone European Council in Berlin in March was devoted to Agenda 2000 when the war in Kosovo was raging. By now, the cost to the European Union of reconstruction in the Balkans has been put at Euro 500 million in commitment appropriations for the year 2000, and no doubt a similar amount for the years thereafter. A further Euro 125 million programmed by the Member States for the Fisheries Agreement between the European Union and Morocco, Euro 135 million for the EU's Financial Protocol with Turkey, and an amount as yet not specified, which will be allocated to East Timor. The Council of Ministers intends to try to resolve the...