Welcome from the Chair
Welcome to the website of the European Parliament's Delegation to the Euronest Parliamentary Assembly (PA).
Especially since its latest enlargements, the EU has a clear interest in maintaining good neighbourly relations with the countries situated on its Eastern flank. For this reason, the EU works hand-in-hand with its six Eastern Partners to support European integration reforms and foster stability, security, democracy and prosperity across the continent.
2019 celebrated the 10th anniversary of the Eastern Neighbourhood policy that underpins our endeavours to deepen and strengthen relations between the EU, its Member States and its Eastern Partners. Truly, collective efforts have brought considerable benefits to the citizens of these countries, especially of the ones that have signed Association Agreements, - including more trade, mobility, increased economic development and a better quality of life.
Established in 2011, the Euronest PA is the parliamentary forum tasked with the scrutiny over this ambitious policy, while promoting the active participation of civil society actors. It brings together the 60 Members of the European Parliament who sit in the Delegation to the Euronest PA, and 50 Members from the national parliaments of our Eastern Partners, i.e. 10 delegates from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine respectively. For the time being, although Belarus is an active Eastern Partner, its National Assembly has not yet been invited to send its 10 delegates to the Euronest PA, because it does not fulfil the necessary, democratic requirements to do so. That being said, we do hope that the absence of Belarusian parliamentarians will only be provisory.
The Euronest PA includes the plenary, chaired by two Co-Presidents (including myself, for the European Parliament's component, in my quality of Chair of the DEPA), the Bureau, four standing committees (on political affairs, economic integration, energy security and social affairs) and three working groups (a group on Belarus, ad hoc group on Association Agreements, and a group on Rules of Procedure). It meets once a year for a plenary session, alternating between the European Parliament's premises and the Eastern Partnership countries.
I hope you will find the information you are looking for on our webpage, and I wish you a fruitful navigation.
Andrius Kubilius