The State Secretary for the European Union, Fernando Sampedro, is receiving representatives of the French and Portuguese Governments in Bilbao on Thursday 3 April, in the so-called “Trilateral” format, to jointly address the main issues on the European agenda and seek to coordinate positions on issues of mutual interest, with a view to their joint defence within the framework of the European Union.
The Spanish State Secretary for the European Union will be joined in the Biscayan capital by his Portuguese counterpart, Inês Domingos, and the French Minister Delegate for Europe, Benjamin Haddad, to address the issues on the European agenda in two blocks.
The first will focus on issues of a more economic nature, including the boost to European competitiveness, regional development -in particular the situation concerning the nine regions, including the Canary Islands, with the European status of the outermost regions-, the next multiannual financial framework, European security and defence funding, and multilateralism and oceans, including the 4th International Conference on Financing for Development to be held in Seville, and the UN Ocean Conference to be held in Nice, with special mention of the automatic renewal of EU fisheries agreements.
The second part of the meeting will focus on three issues with an external dimension for the European Union: migration, enlargement and EU reforms, and the Union's own external relations, particularly with the Southern Neighbourhood, Latin America and the Caribbean, the transatlantic link and the African continent, with the aim of further advancing relations with our like-minded partners.
“Atlantic Macro-Regional Strategy”
Before the working session begins, the two State Secretaries and the Minister Delegate will have had the opportunity to attend, at the Guggenheim Museum, a presentation of the Atlantic Macro-Regional Strategy project, organised by the Basque Government, which holds the presidency of the Atlantic Arc Commission of the Conference of Peripheral Maritime Regions.
The presentation will propose the creation of a European strategy for the Atlantic macro-region, with the goal of promoting initiatives and projects that contribute to the harmonious development of the Atlantic region.
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