With
the ratification of the Cotonou Agreement and the lodging of the legal
and related instrumentsby more than
the requisite number of countries, the required quorum has been attained
by the ACP side. Nonetheless, the Agreement cannot come into effect until
similarprocedures
have been duly accomplished by the European Union.
In
conformity with Article 93 thereon, the Cotonou Agreement must be ratified
by two thirds of the ACP countries (51 out of 77) on the one hand, and
by the fifteen Member-States of the European Union and the European Community
(Council, Commission and Parliament) on the other hand, before all its
provisions can come into force. Up till now, only six EU countries have
met this requirement. They are: Denmark, United Kingdom, Sweden, Finland,
France and Germany, in that order. Announcing
to the Committee of Ambassadors on Thursday, 23rd instant, that
the ACP quorum for the ratification of the Agreement had been attained
as 52 ACP countries had deposited their instruments of ratification, interim
Chairman, Ambassador Peter O. Ole Nkuraiya of Kenya recalled the importance
the Group accorded the formality, without which the financial package of
over 13 billion Euros accorded by the European Development Fund for the
development of the ACP countries during the first five years of the implementation
of the Agreement, cannot be mobilized. He informed the Committee that the
President of Council, who passed through Brussels last week, had sent a
letter to those ACP countries which had no yet ratified the Agreement or
deposited the instruments of ratification, urging them to do so as soon
as possible, in any case before the ACP and ACP-EU Council meetings scheduled
for Punta Cana from 25 to 28 June 2002. The
Cotonou Agreement was signed on 23 June 2000. The ratification of the previous
Lome conventions required 18 months for ratification. The signatory parties
to the last agreement undertook to meet the challenge of shortening the
deadline. Pending
the coming into effect of the Agreement, transitional measures were agreed
by both the parties at Cotonou,in
June 2000, by the Joint Council of Ministers for a period up to the end
of May 2002, for the Agreement was supposed to have been ratified before
that date. The decision to extend them indefinitely was taken by an extraordinary
meeting of the Committee of Ambassadors held on 21 May this year. *
Cuba, a member-state, is not yet signatory to the Cotonou Agreement. contact :
Hegel Goutier
tel +32
2 743 06 04
fax +32 2 743 06 58
www.acp.int
List of countries having ratified
the Cotonou Agreement and having
deposited the instruments of ratification.