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Economic governance: Council and Commission must stick to the '6 pack' deal
Verhofstadt: "Nothing less than full economic and fiscal union including eurobonds will do"
A European Regulatory Body will require Member States to open up their railway markets
Nine years since the entry into force of the first railway package and after 13 Member States have been referred to the Court of justice by the Commission for having incorrectly or incompletely transposed it, the European Parliament has now approved changes to establishing a single European railway area.
Council agrees to EP proposal to limit phosphorus in consumer dishwasher detergents
At the meeting of the Permanent Representatives' Committee on November 15th, EU Member States agreed to accept the draft compromise on the proposals to limit the content of phosphorus permitted in consumer detergents.
Verhofstadt on how to break the European deadlock
Guy Verhofstadt, President of the ALDE Group in the European Parliament, speaking at the European Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong said:
Online Gambling: EP passes the ball on to the Commission
The European Parliament has just voted for more European coordination and common standards in the field of online gambling in a resolution approved on November 15th in Strasbourg. As for the next step, it will be up to the European Commission to present a corresponding legislative proposal. The online gambling sector is one of the few remaining tradable services not to be regulated at EU level.
Independent science should be at the heart of regulatory decision-making
Responsible mining in the EU: best practices to overcome the raw materials crisis
European Commission Proposal: "Amendment on Credit Rating Agency Regulations"
Commission wants better quality credit ratings
Brussels, 15 November 2011 - Credit rating agencies (CRAs) are major players in today's financial markets, with rating actions having a direct impact on the actions of investors, borrowers, issuers and governments. For example, a corporate downgrade can have consequences on the capital a bank must hold and a downgrade of sovereign debt makes a country's borrowing more expensive. Despite the adoption of European legislation on credit rating agencies in 2009 and 2010, recent developments in the context of the euro debt crisis have shown our existing regulatory framework is not good enough. So, on November 15th the Commission put forward proposals to toughen that framework further and deal with outstanding weaknesses.
2. More transparent and more frequent sovereign debt ratings 3. More diversity and stricter independence of credit rating agencies to eliminate conflicts of interest 4. To make CRAs more accountable for the ratings they provide
ALDE Response to Commission's Proposal on Credit Rating Agency Regulations
French credit rating error shows need to review regulation
The European Commission has published on November 15th its proposal amending the regulations on Credit Rating Agencies (CRAs) from 2009. Wolf Klinz (FDP, Germany), author of the European Parliament's report on the future regulation of CRAs which was adopted in June 2011, commented:
"Do not shoot the messenger, CRAs cannot be blamed for everything. However, there is a need for immediate action due to key weaknesses in the system. We need more transparency, accountability and less reliance on external credit ratings as well as increasing competition in the sector. The current case of France shows how dependent markets are on external credit ratings. We will have to carefully assess if the Commission's proposal credibly addresses this problem. Reducing over-reliance is of the utmost importance in this matter, we need to restore investors' ability and willingness to conduct their own due diligence and risk assessment".
The European Commission's proposal takes on board many of the points raised in the European Parliament's own report on CRAs. It introduces civil liability for CRAs, a European Rating Index (EURIX) and it proposes various measures aimed at reducing remaining conflicts of interest. On the call for measures to reduce the quasi-oligopolistic industry structure Mr Klinz concluded: "Unfortunately the Commission did not follow the Parliament's request to conduct a detailed impact assessment on the establishment of an independent and autonomous European Credit Rating Foundation to foster competition".
HELSINKI 2.0 - Liberals and Democrats call for democracy and the rule of law in Russia
Liberals and Democrats in the European Parliament hosted this week a conference in Helsinki on how to address the lack of democracy in Russia. Inspired by the Helsinki process in the 1970s to ease Cold War tensions and promote common values, we are urging a new process to be initiated - Helsinki 2.0 - to engage Russia constructively on a path that respects democracy and the rule of law.
Guy Verhofstadt, Liberal and Democrat group leader in the European Parliament said:
“Russia is a self-declared 'managed democracy' in which opposition parties are banned from participating in the forthcoming elections, the Presidency and Prime Minister posts are decided behind closed doors, judicial process is influenced by political pressure and censorship impinges on freedom of expression and press freedom. The West cannot continue business as usual with Russia as long as there is no change.”
“Russia is too big to isolate or ignore. We need therefore to elaborate a new strategy for relations based on respect for basic principles of democracy and the rule of law. A more critical stance vis-à-vis the authorities should be matched by greater opening to Russian citizens and civil society. We shall create a Helsinki 2.0 watch group to monitor Russian democratic developments with a view to producing an assessment in Spring 2012.”
Kristiina Ojuland (Reform Party, Estonia), ALDE spokesperson on added:
“There should be honest international recognition that the forthcoming elections are not in line with democratic standards nor with Russia's own Constitution and the credentials of the new Duma representatives in international parliamentary organizations like the Council of Europe should be challenged.”
“The European Union should revise the strategy of its relationship with the Russian Federation. Democracy and the rule of law should be the first item on the agenda.”
See on website a summary of the recommendations resulting from the Helsinki 2.0 conference.
ALDELAT delegation visit to Guatemala November 2-7th for election observation
An ALDELAT delegation visited Guatemala from 2 to 7 November 2011 to observe the second round of the Presidential elections that took place on 6 November. MEPs Renate Weber and Izaskun Bilbao Barandica had the opportunity to meet with EU ambassadors, former Foreign Affairs Minister and President of the Chamber of Commerce Jorge Briz, General Procurator for Human Rights Sergio Morales, as well as members of the Sobrevivientes Foundation and Rigoberta Menchú Foundation.
(Photo: newly elected Guatemalan President Otto Perez Molina and Vice President Roxana Baldetti + Izaskun Bilbao Barandica and Renate Weber)
Kristiina Ojuland (Reform Party, Estonia)
Kristiina Ojuland is a former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Estonia, who presided over the accession of the country to NATO and to the EU. She is currently the ALDE spokesperson on Russia, being a Member of the Delegation to the EU-Russia Parliamentary Cooperation Committee and of the Committee on Foreign Affairs. Her political career spans nearly 20 years and includes holding positions as Chair of the EU Affairs Committee and First Deputy Speaker of the Estonian Parliament; Vice-President of the ELDR Party; and President of the LDR Group and Vice-President of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. She has graduated from the University of Tartu with a degree in law and also holds an MA in political science from the same university.
Kristiina is an outspoken advocate of human rights, civil liberties, democracy and the rule of law in EU neighbourhood countries and globally. She is convinced that those principles must be applied universally and that none of the EU policies towards third countries should be exercised in a vacuum, but closely interlinked with European values. Kristiina is of Estonian and Russian descent and takes a keen interest in encouraging regime transition and consolidating democracy in Russia and other former Soviet states, in particular Belarus and the Ukraine. She champions the struggle for greater freedom on a global scale: Tibetans and Uyghurs in China; women, LGBT people and religious minorities in Muslim countries and Sub-Saharan Africa are a few of the causes that she supports.
Kristiina lives with her partner Raimo, a businessman, by the seaside on the northern coast of Estonia and thus being familiar with the region, acknowledges the need for a coherent Baltic Sea Strategy that engages littoral communities and addresses the environmental, economic, educational and cultural issues related to the region. She oversaw the political, economic and monetary integration of Estonia to Europe; however, she would also like to see the country linked to the European infrastructure, in particular via Rail Baltic.
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Resource efficiency - Transformation to a green economy  LNG (Liquified Natural Gas) as Ship Fuel How European Zoos are treating their animals
Alliance for Liberals and Democrats for Europe - ALDE European Liberal Democrat and Reform Party - ELDR European Democratic Party - EDP
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Intervening in an important debate during the November Strasbourg plenary on the future scope and structure of economic governance in Europe, Guy Verhofstadt (ALDE group leader) drew attention to widening spreads on European bond markets - even amongst AAA countries - and called for a bold and global step forward towards economic and fiscal union - the missing piece from the EMU project dating back 20 years to the Treaty of Maastricht. 
