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At
last, the much expected decision has been taken and the new members
will be able to take part in this highly popular community cultural
action. On 26 January, at the meeting of the Committee on culture, youth,
education, the media and sport of the European Parliament a document
was submitted by the Commission. The document proposed to amend the
Council decision 1419/1999/EC and extend the programme to the countries
that join the Union on 1 May. It also referred to a later amendment
to include Bulgaria and Romania.
The
essence of the change is in the annex of the Council decision, which
will look like this:
|
2005
|
Ireland
(Cork)
|
|
|
2006
|
Greece
(Patras)
|
|
|
2007
|
Luxembourg
|
Romania
(Sibiu)
|
|
2008
|
United
Kingdom (Liverpool)
|
Norway
(Stavanger)
|
|
2009
|
Austria
|
Lithuania
|
|
2010
|
Germany
|
Hungary
|
|
2011
|
Finland
|
Estonia
|
|
2012
|
Portugal
|
Slovenia
|
|
2013
|
France
|
Slovakia
|
|
2014
|
Sweden
|
Latvia
|
|
2015
|
Belgium
|
Czech
Republic
|
|
2016
|
Spain
|
Poland
|
|
2017
|
Denmark
|
Cyprus
|
|
2018
|
Netherlands
|
Malta
|
|
2019
|
Italy
|
|
Note:
The information on 2007-2008 was added after the Council
meeting at the end of May.
A few
months earlier we put on the web a writing on
the theme, sour about east and central Europe being left out. (The inclusion
of Cracow and Prague in 2000 was not exactly the same thing.) One subtitle
asked Wroclaw, cultural capital in 2008? As we see in the table, our expectation was one year too early.
From point of view of principle it does not matter that the first title
goes to neighbour Lithuania. BO
feels satisfaction.
The
document recalls the very appropriate recommendation in the original
1999 decision whereby "a linkage between the programmes of the
designated cities of the same year should be made".
It
must be noted that for long (and maybe even today) the decision is formally
not yet taken. BO first learned from kind rumours about the develoments
that the document describes the following way: "This proposed amendment
was prepared with the full cooperation of the Member States and the
accession countries, which were able to express their preferences during
an informal consultation exercise launched by the Commission among the
new States during 2003." Although the proposal dates from 17 November,
we could first read it by way of the ENCATC newsletter. Unless you know
the exact source you will have a hell of a time before you find it on
the Europa site.
No
conspiracy here, just the normal dreadfulness of the functioning of
the huge and complex EU bureaucracy.
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