As Co-President of the Euronest Parliamentary Assembly Rebecca Harms addressed the Heads of State and Government at the Eastern Partnership Summit in Brussels on 24 November 2017.

Dear President Tusk,

Dear President Juncker,

Dear President Tajani,

Dear Prime Minister of Estonia, (Dear Mr Ratas)

Dear High Representative/Vice-President Mogherini, Dear Commissioner Hahn,

Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,

It is a big honour for me, as Co-President of the Euronest Parliamentary Assembly, after many years of political work in Eastern Europe , to address you today.

After Vilnius 2013 and Riga 2015 today's Summit is a unique opportunity to mark our commitment for the way ahead.

The Euronest PA had its 6th Parliamentary Assembly three weeks ago in Kyiv.

I wish to present to you just a few core messages our Bureau has adopted for this summit:

A clear political vision for the future of the Eastern Partnership, European aspirations and differentiation go hand in hand:

- Inclusiveness, for us, means welcoming  Eastern Partners with their differences,

- In spite of the expressed wish of members of Euronest the conditions for welcoming members of the Belarus parliament in the assembly are not yet in place,

- members of Euronest Assembly were quite open to welcome Belarus but so far the process  failed for well-known reasons,

- let me add here that human rights are not only an issue we have with Belarus.

Along with inclusiveness, we highly value differentiation:

- in Euronest we have created a new Working Group dedicated to the exchange of experiences on the implementation of the Association Agreements between the EU and Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine;

- since you have mentioned during the debate that the mood of discussions has changed also between our partners Armenia and Azerbaidjan I would like to confirm this and the delegations of the two countries also supported the new working group;

- for the associated countries implementation comes first now.  We hope to improve the reform process with this new Working Group. We will be pleased to put our results at your disposal as we believe, like you, that the EU should duly support those countries who chose to conclude and implement ambitious Association Agreements;

On our front, as an Assembly composed of legislators, we should make an effort to render the implementation and reforms process as smooth and sustainable as possible!

As much as we agree on the principle of “more for more” and that conditionality matters, we would like to  reflect on the quality of these conditions.

I am well aware of the internal development in the EU and in our Partnership countries.  Knowing that membership for many reasons will happen rather later than sooner: it makes no sense and it is not right to close our doors. This would not only be an additional burden for societies in the difficult process of change. It would also support the strategy of the Kremlin.

I would like to draw your attention, Excellencies, to the Euronest Bureau calls on you to address security threats and to work for viable solutions including, if necessary, by making room to additional EU-led mediation and peacekeeping efforts or formats.

Protracted conflicts, war and occupation in the Eastern Neighbourhood pose a serious wound to the security in our continent and they cannot have a military solution. The EU must maintain unity and not compromise with Russia on respect for international law.

It goes without saying that our Assembly stays ready to provide all possible support and space for dialogue. We are grateful to our Eastern Partner Members of Euronest for their constructive attitude and readiness to compromise during our proceedings.

As an Assembly, we are gradually acquiring more maturity, which  will hopefully allow us to contribute to possible new conflict mediation initiatives.

I would like to end by thanking the Prime Minister of Georgia who told us here about the piece of the Berlin Wall which is now shown in the center of Tibilissi. I am a German Member of the European Parliament and I am convinced that the reunification process on this continent is not yet finished. Peace and stability in the EU is at risk without a stable democratic development in  Eastern Europe. Europe is much bigger than the European Union. To be tired of the bigger Europe is an attitude we cannot afford.

Thank you.