President Duda: The EU needs to review its internal policy

“We, the Poles, are citizens of a country that for many years tried to become an EU member state. In the end, our attempts and efforts proved successful. Today, we are a member of the European Union. And something that I want to stress: for us, for the absolute majority of the Polish citizens, this is of great value. I think we all see different benefits stemming from our membership in the EU,” the President stressed when inaugurating the 27th Economic Forum.

However, as he mentioned, the EU is in need of reforms. “We need to try to fix the EU, to put our proposals forward, because the EU is worth it. It is worth being in the EU,” Duda stressed.

“It is worth being an EU member state; it is worth trying to become the same. Sure it is difficult, sure the developments in the political situation make it difficult, sure the crises in the EU make it difficult as well. Why? Because, as a result, the EU member states are less and less willing to accept new members,” the President assessed.

He stressed that the Poles support the EU of ‘open doors’. “We think that the EU should be open to new countries that could become the member states in the future,” the President added. According to President Duda, opening to new countries means incorporating new cultural values, providing new economic and exports possibilities and enabling political cooperation.

“Present EU is home to 0.5 billion people. The growth in the number of the EU citizens and in the territory of the EU resulting from the accession of new countries would enable the EU, as a whole, to compete with the world’s top economies like the U.S. or China. New member states – and of this I am sure – would increase the potential of the EU,” the President thinks.

According to the President, closing the EU and saying “no other country shall be made a new EU member state”, would be an “absolute mistake”. “Why? Because – in my opinion – the optimistic prospects would vanish then,” President Duda said. He remarked that “The EU needs to stay open, as this increases its attractiveness.” He assured the attendees that Poland supported and still supports other countries’ attempts to join the EU.

The President also noted that nowadays the EU is not free of crises. “We have Brexit, refugees and even the financial crisis that is still palpable. These are the facts which are generally not argued with in the EU arena,” he noted. Therefore, there is a question of “How to deal with these crises and how to prevent future ones”, he added.

“In my opinion, a crisis is something inevitable. It is something that will always be present because of this or that reason, and something that is very difficult to predict. A crisis is usually sudden and surprising,” he stated. As he said, both Brexit and the immigration crisis came as a shock to the EU.

The President assessed that the “EU needs to review its internal policy”. “Personally, I am against federalizing the EU. I think that it should be a union of free and equal countries. All EU member states should be treated in the same way. In my opinion, if today we are to talk about the actual threat to the EU, to its existence, this would not be Brexit,” Andrzej Duda assessed.

According to him, the real danger lies in creating a “multi-speed EU”. As he assessed, if the EU “Starts to officially divide itself into the EU of different speeds, i.e. into countries that will have greater development, decision-making options and that will formally be able to decide about the future of other countries – it will become less attractive.”

“Both, and first and foremost, to all those countries that will be considered EU category B or C, but also to those assigned to category A,” he added.

In the President’s opinion, should the EU become “less appealing” to countries “excluded from the decisive group” this will “in fact be the beginning of its end”. He based that on this, that countries that nowadays have and optimistic attitude towards the EU will feel “rejected” and as a result – as the President stressed – “Confidence in the EU will drop, and this will result in other +exits+”.

According to Andrzej Duda, to prevent that from happening “a revision of the EU internal policy” is a must. The President indicated that, among others, a less restrictive law should be called for. “We constantly hear that the EU is introducing certain bans or restrictive solutions. This is what is most discouraging about the EU – the red tape and this particular element,” he said.

Źródło: tvn24.pl/tłumaczenie Intertext.com.pl