Message from Mr. Adrian Severin,
President of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly
to the Second Regional Conference for South East Europe

On behalf of the Parliamentary Assembly of the OSCE let me send you my best regards and wishes for success to the Second Regional Conference for SEE.

South East Europe has gone through dramatic, even traumatic experiences during the last decade. The process of change is still problematic and peace has not yet settled in the entire region. Therefore it is essential that the countries of the region work together, and in cooperation with other states of the OSCE region, to stabilize peace, to promote economic progress and prosperity and to strengthen the respect of human rights and the rule of law.

The representatives of the three European Parliamentary Institutions, the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and the European Parliament, met in Brussels last September at the invitation of the European Parliament. In this conference the three Parliamentary Institutions, inter alia, emphasized the need to promote, modernize and liberalize the economic structures in South East Europe. This can only be done with the participation and the cooperation between the Governments and the private sector. Governments should also make sure that bureaucracy does not prevent development. I find it scandalous, for instance, that the clearing the Danube does not proceed, mainly for bureaucratic reasons. The construction of infrastructure is needed. All countries of the region also need to be integrated to the European and relevant other international structures. At the conference in Brussels the representatives of the three Parliamentary Institutions also emphasized the need to promote the rule of law. Among others, we discussed the need to fight corruption and the trafficking in persons.

We are now at the point when we should ask ourselves about the successes and the failures of the Stability Pact. Indeed, the proof of the pudding is in the eating.

We have to admit that one of the major failures of the Stability Pact has been the fact that we were not able to muster the political will of the South-European States in order to define and promote regional/transborder projects. On the other hand, the stark reality is that countries should pledge to make a concrete contribution - even by allotting a declared quota of their GNP - for supporting the Stability Pact.

Another failure of the Pact has been the incapacity to mobilize donors, mainly among private businessmen and investors. Obviously, various forms of incentives can and must be found.

At the Brussels Conference I put forward the idea of organizing an intergovernmental conference on the Balkans This conference could define in specific terms the basis for security and stability in the region along certain major lines:

1. to create the necessary international political and legal instruments to fix and guarantee State borders in South-Eastern Europe and reinforce commitments towards the independence and sovereignty of these States;
2. to adopt a binding programme for the regional economic, security and political integration as a prerequisite condition to and a part of, the European Union integration process;
3. to promote regional security through economic cooperation and economic development based on a minimal but firm programme of common projects, as well as within a frame of legal, political, financial and economic incentives granted by all governments to private and public donors;
4. to address and overcome the ethnic/cultural issues at a regional level, setting the main features of a civic multicultural State.

I also want to emphasize the responsibility of international organizations, such as the OSCE and the Council of Europe. The European Union, in particular, has large resources and possibilities in promoting the process of change. It has been said that "the European bureaucracy has moved the Balkans to Brussels". That may be so. I would, however, suggest that a bit of Brussels should be moved to the Balkans.

The above-mentioned areas are amongst those where the parliamentarians, as legislators and politicians, feel they have a special responsibility. In this respect I would recall, as an example, the Declaration of the OSCE PA Nantes Conference which included a point concerning the constitution of a South East European Energy Community based on a joint approach to energy security by the countries of the region, on the assurance of access to resources and the promotion of a rational use of energy respecting the environment and the Energy Charter standards. Still, the point is we have not agreed on a common energy policy. It is a field worth exploring and exploiting.

Should the Bucharest Conference confine itself to stating good intentions, reiterating the general determination of South East European States to further reforms and regional cooperation, and reaffirming an abstract and hypothetical political and financial support of the international community to the region, all the expectations attached to it will be frustrated. There is no point in drafting appealing documents if we fail to put them into practice. Now is the time for more deeds and less words.

The OSCE PA is ready and willing to give its support, on its own and as a Member of the Tri-Parliamentary Troika, to all positive and realistic initiatives.