French Minister cites mutual interest with Poland in limiting CAP changes
France yesterday pledged common interest with Poland in limiting changes to
expensive European Union (EU) rural subsidy programs. France's Minister for
European Affairs, Pierre Moscovici, said Paris did not share the view of
some EU members that reform of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) was
vital to make EU membership for 10 mostly ex-communist eastern states
affordable. Making enlargement conditional on changes to the CAP, from which
France is a major beneficiary, would throw the timetable for ending
negotiations this year off course and delay the admission of new states
beyond the 2004 target, the French Minister explained. Moscovici, in Warsaw
for a day of meetings with Polish EU integration officials, said France and
Poland, as the two largest agricultural states in a future Union, had a
mutual interest in limiting changes to the CAP. "We have a common position:
no to deregulation, no to a liberalization that goes too far, but yes to
evolution of the CAP in a pragmatic manner," he said. (Reuters)
