The ALE affirms that the European Union must do more common policy

The ALE affirms that the European Union must do more common policy

The president of NCs, Román Rodríguez, and the head of ALE, Lorena López de Lacalle. / cover

The European Free Alliance, in which Nueva Canarias is a member, celebrates this week its general assembly in Gran Canaria

B. HERNANDEZ The Gran Canarian palms.

The
European Free Alliance (EFA) celebrates its general assembly this week in Gran Canaria and its president, Lorena López de Lacalle, advocates that the European Union (EU) begin to establish
common policies beyond those currently adopted and
overcome "state».

López de Lacalle presented this meeting accompanied by the president of
New Canary -one of the parties integrated into the Alliance-, Román Rodríguez, who welcomed the holding of this assembly in Gran Canaria so that the participants "feel" what the Canary Islands mean.

The archipelago is one of the territories with the most ties to the EU due to its ultraperipheral status and, as such, a community with a differentiated status and the Spanish community that participates the most in community funds.

Sahara

One of the topics of debate will focus on the situation of the
Sahara and the "perverse inaction contrary to international law" of the Government of Spain, according to the president of ALE. She added that the Sahara "has won battles in Europe" but always from an economic point of view, which is why she defends the EU entering "more into politics" as it has done in Ukraine.

In this regard, Román Rodríguez recalled that the Parliament of the Canary Islands voted against, with the PSOE abstaining, the
turn of the Spanish governmentas happened in the Congress, which "shows that it is not only a matter of those who are committed to international legality, the rights of the Saharawi people or human rights, but of a large majority".

He pointed out that the Foreign Minister, José Manuel Albares, will come to the Canary Islands this month to explain the situation that he described as "unreasonable."

peace and solidarity

Yesterday, when the presentation coincided with Europe Day, De Lacalle called for a return to the fundamental values ​​of the EU:
solidarity between member states and the "longing" for peaceindicated on the 75th day of the Ukraine war, that "it should never have happened."

In his opinion, "we are in a difficult and convulsive political moment", but he was optimistic because "crises must be taken advantage of to improve". Although Europe is in a weak situation due to its situation of energy and food dependence, he understands that in this sense, too, the solution must come from a
"coordinated" action».

This "coordinated and forceful" reaction must also take place in
immigration. In his opinion, one of the difficulties for this is that politics in the EU "continues to be nationalized", a position that the ALE criticizes, while advocating "a common European policy that works differently with Africa".

Taxation

Likewise, he defended a
more harmonized taxationalthough he acknowledged that "it will be a battle for the special regimes such as those of the Canary Islands, the Basque Country or Navarra that we do not want to lose rights", although he considers that if Europe "has recognized taxation, it will now sell us a discounted ticket" .

Likewise, the president of the ALE pointed out that in a participatory process that has just been closed, and that includes proposals from the Alliance, Europe is urged to be more “bold” such as the vote at 16 years; a European Parliament with real powers or an improvement in asylum policies.

In addition, he indicated that there are already several heads of state who are asking for a "
revision and reformulation of European treaties».

Decarbonization

On the other hand,
Roman Rodriguez referred during the presentation to one of the issues that will be addressed in the assembly, that of the
sustainable transportto point out that decarbonization is a decisive element in the fight against the climate crisis, but rejected that its costs be "endorsed" to the outermost regions.

The European Union has set a 55% reduction in emissions by 2030 - the
Target 55- but the leader of Nueva Canarias considers that charging the cost of decarbonisation in transport to the outermost regions "would make life impossible".

He recalled that the Canary Islands have a
exception for air transportwhich you expect to be "permanent" and
hopes that it will also be transferred to maritime transport. This, she said, will be a "very intense debate in which the Canaries" will have to fight.

assembly agenda

The European Free Alliance (EFA) celebrates
between Thursday 12 and Saturday 14 of this month of May their general assembly in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria where they will address issues such as the "inconceivable" change of the Government of Spain on the Sahara or immigration.

In addition, at the proposal of the Canarian partner of ALE, Nueva Canarias, there will be a debate on sustainable transport, an issue that both Lorena López de Lacalle and Román Rodríguez highlighted as being of special importance in island territories.

islands forum

One of the objectives of this meeting is the launch of a
islands forum, in which all the political parties of ALE present in the islands of Europe will be integrated. In addition to the Canary or Balearic Islands, there will be Friesland, Sardinia, Corsica or the Finnish Aland.

All the islands, said De Lacalle, "have the same problems but the actions are different", so one of the objectives is "
take advantage of synergies».

Immigration will also be on the agenda of the 250 representatives of this group who will meet this week in Gran Canaria. The ALE is made up of
49 matches from 19 countries and has 10 deputies in the European Parliament, of which ten are Spanish.

It advocates "the decentralization of states to a greater or lesser degree, self-determination, in some cases in favor of independence and in others in favor of greater autonomy, as well as greater defense of the linguistic or cultural rights of the idiosyncrasies that we represent" , he claimed.

Source link