PM Tusk in Paris for EU presidency talks
PR dla Zagranicy
Peter Gentle
03.06.2011 12:01
Prime Minister Donald Tusk is having talks in Paris today with President Nicolas Sarkozy and his French counterpart Francois Fillon, just four weeks before the beginning of Poland’s six-month presidency of the EU Council.
President Sarkozy greets PM Tusk in Paris; photo - EPA
The talks include the 27 nation bloc’s long-term budget and enlargement prospects. Poland and France do not see eye-to-eye on the EU budget for the 2014 - 20 period. France, alongside Germany, Britain and Sweden – net payers to the budget – are for decreasing its size, whereas Poland, one of the net beneficiaries, would like the bloc’s budget the remain at the present level.
The situation in North Africa and the current problems of the Schengen free-travel zone are also to be taken up in the talks.
President Sarkozy recently called for a temporary resumption of border controls to check an influx of migrants from outside the EU.
The Polish Prime Minister declared that he is ready to listen to all arguments of EU partners on how to eliminate the negative phenomena stemming from illegal immigration but stressed that for Poland free travel within the European Union is treated as one of the most cherished benefits of membership.
The spokesman for the Polish EU presidency, Konrad Niklewicz, recalled in a statement for the Polish Press Agency (PAP) that in recent months Prime Minister Tusk has held discussions with his counterparts in Holland, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Britain and Sweden, as well as with the heads of the most important EU institutions.
“The aim of all these talks was to enlist support for the programme of the Polish presidency which begins on 1 July,” he said. (mk/pg)