'Intercultural dialogue' to dominate Euro-Med meeting[fr] 

During a recent meeting of the EMPA  bureau in the Tunisian Parliament to decide next week's assembly session agenda  [FR]  an extraordinary meeting in Cairo in June was also proposed, to examine the situation in the Middle East and the possibility of an EMPA delegation being sent to the region.

The meeting was chaired by Fouad Mbazaa, president of the Tunisian Chamber of Deputies. Other participants included EMPA Vice-Presidents Anna Benaki, president of the Hellenic parliament (and next EMPA president), Ahmed Fathi Sorour, president of the People's Assembly of Egypt and Hans-Gert Pöttering, president of the European Parliament and EMPA vice-president, who said: "Dialogue between cultures is the way to build real bridges. That is why I have proposed it as a main topic of the next plenary sitting."

Pöttering, who has placed cultural dialogue as one of his priorities as president of the European Parliament (highlighted in his Inaugural Speech to Parliament  in Strasbourg on 13 February), stressed the particular need for such dialogue between Europe and the Islamic world and urged that the Euro-Med assembly be geared towards "peace and partnership".

EMPA's third ordinary session will take place in Tunis on 16-17 March 2007 and will bring together deputies from both sides of the Mediterranean. In addition to intercultural dialogue, delegates are set to discuss the challenge of employment in the Euro-Mediterranean region.