EU en Chili maken afspraak om betrekkingen te verbeteren (en) - Hoofdinhoud
At the summit held in Madrid, the European Union and Chile agreed to improve and strengthen relations, especially in the fields of energy and trade, five years after the launch of the Association Agreement, one of the most ambitious agreements reached with a third country.
This was the fourth EU-Chile Summit since the start of the agreement in 2005. The meeting was held as part of the EU-Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) Summit that will gather representatives from the 27 EU Member States and the more than 30 countries that make up the LAC group in the Spanish capital this Tuesday.
The EU was represented by the President of the Spanish Government, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, the host of the meeting; the President of the European Council, Herman Van Rompuy i; and the President of the European Commission, José Manuel Durão Barroso i, while Chile was represented by its President, Sebastián Piñera.
During the meeting, the European representatives once more expressed their solidarity with Chile after the terrible earthquake that devastated the country on 27 February and declared their ongoing commitment to reconstruction, after the emergency and humanitarian aid offered in the immediate aftermath.
Both parties examined matters of mutual regional and global interest such as climate change and the world economy, as well as bilateral issues such as the Association for Development and Innovation that will lead to more cooperation in the fields of investment, trade and education.
The EU expressed its satisfaction at Chile's commitment to reducing CO2 emissions in the framework of the Copenhagen Accord and stressed the importance that the next meeting in Cancún (Mexico) is a success, which will involve reaching concrete decisions.
The work faced by Chile, which will hold the Presidency of the Rio Group, and as host of the group of Latin American and Caribbean countries (LAC) at the next EU-LAC Summit in 2014, was also viewed positively.
The European representatives also applauded the entry of Chile into the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, a process supported from the beginning by the EU, which makes Chile the first South American country to join the organisation.
José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero i , stressed the importance of the EU's strategic association with Chile - a level of relations that the EU also has with Mexico - and expressed admiration for the “institutional and civic serenity” with which Chile faced the consequences of the earthquake.
The President of Chile, Sebastián Piñera, expressed his gratitude for the collaboration and solidarity of the EU in moments of adversity and confirmed that he faces two great challenges: first, to reconstruct the country, and then to transform it during the coming decade to “overcome underdevelopment and poverty”.
Piñera therefore announced reforms for the disaster early warning system and the creation of a national emergency agency, for which European collaboration will be “very important”.
He especially highlighted the EU's commitment to collaborate in matters such as renewable energy (wind, geothermal, tidal or biofuels) to achieve a more sustainable world in which economic growth should be compatible with protecting nature.