Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 19 May 2004
64 Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs if he has sought agreement from the EU Foreign Ministers on a role for the EU Commission in monitoring implementation of Millennium Development Goal eight on coherence. [14611/04]
View answer80 Aengus Ó Snodaigh asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs the specific actions the Government has taken on the Millennium Development Goals since assuming the EU Presidency in January 2004; and the additional specific actions the Government will take on the Millennium Development Goals up to the conclusion of the EU Presidency in June 2004. [14608/04]
View answerI propose to take Questions Nos. 64 and 80 together.
From the outset of our EU Presidency, Ireland has promoted strong leadership by the EU on the Millennium Development Goals, MDGs. In January 2004, we used the occasion of the annual Orientation Debate on the Effectiveness of the EU's External Actions, at the General Affairs and External Relations Council, GAERC, to highlight the central importance of the Millennium Development Goals to the EU's foreign and development policies.
The GAERC adopted conclusions which state that achieving the MDGs is a key objective for the European Union and the wider international community, and that the commitments made by EU member states at the 2002 Monterrey Conference on Financing for Development reflect the Union's leadership role in international efforts to achieve the MDGs.
UN member states have agreed to convene a major event, possibly a summit at Heads of State or Government level, in New York in September 2005 to review progress towards achieving the MDGs in the period 2000 to 2005. As most of the MDGs have set 2015 as the target date for their achievement, the 2005 review meeting in New York will be the first major milestone on the road to 2015.
Ireland believes that the EU should contribute to this UN stocktaking exercise through a co-ordinated EU report. At the GAERC on 27 April, on the basis of a Presidency initiative, Ministers mandated the Commission to co-ordinate an EU input to the September 2005 UN stocktaking. The Council conclusions provide that each member state must submit a national MDG report to the Commission on the basis of an agreed reporting format. The Commission will then synthesise these national reports into a joint EU report which, after discussion and approval by Ministers, will be submitted to the UN next year.
The Council conclusions make clear that the national MDG reports must pay particular attention to MDG eight, global partnership for development, which embraces such issues as levels of official development assistance, debt and trade. This particular goal is most relevant to donors and needs to be examined in detail in the national MDG reports.
In addition to these actions at the GAERC, the Presidency has used every possible opportunity to highlight the importance of the MDGs and to promote the EU's view that development policies and programmes need to be aligned with the objectives of the goals. In his address to the spring meeting of the UN's Economic and Social Council, ECOSOC, with the Bretton Woods Institutions and the World Trade Organisation, the Minister for Finance, Deputy Charlie McCreevy, expressed the EU's profound concern over the faltering progress towards the MDGs in Sub-Saharan Africa. He called for greater policy coherence at the national and international levels and for UN members to meet the commitments made at the International Conference on Financing for Development in March 2002.
The Irish EU Presidency will also work to ensure that the MDGs are placed at the centre of the development related discussions in the forthcoming meeting of the World Health Assembly in Geneva, at the eleventh UN Conference on Trade and Development, UNCTAD XI, in Brazil in June and at the ministerial high level segment of ECOSOC on 28 June.
