Europeans pledge 12.7 billion Euros to Euro-Med partnership for six coming years

Originally published November 17, 2000

European officials who attended the Marseilles Conference pledged 12.75 billion EUROS to Euro-Mediterranean partnership for the coming six years.

A total of 6.4 billion EUROS will be granted as loans by the European Investment Bank (EIB), the MEDA-II subsidy program gets 5.35 billion EUROS and the remaining one billion EUROS will be used by EIB in operations not guaranteed by the Union.

Figures were released Thursday in a meeting devoted to economic matters where Morocco presented an assessment of the EuroMed for the last five years and a new approach to the partnership for the years to come.

Southern countries, indeed, complained of MEDA I complex procedures which only allowed for the use of 26% of the 3.4 billion EUROS pledged. European officials said in Marseilles the unused 74% will not be annulled.