The Chairperson of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Andriy Parubiy opened the session. MPs delivered their statements, announcements, and proposals.

The body of today’s work:

Bill No.0160 on EIB’s 20-year loan

The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine has adopted a draft bill No. 0160 constituting a law of Ukraine to ratify a financial Agreement (Project “The Higher Education of Ukraine”) between Ukraine and the European Investment Bank, signed in Brussels on December 19, 2016 amounting to EUR 120 m, with another EUR 10 m to be granted by the Eastern Europe Energy Efficiency and Environmental Partnership Fund (‘E5P’). Ukraine is supposed to be a co-financier on the project, with the direct borrower being the Ministry of Finance of Ukraine, administered at large by the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine. The ultimate beneficiaries on the project are to be state-owned higher education establishments meeting the project eligibility criteria. The interest rate is to be either flat rate or floating rate; the loan repayment period is set at twenty years, having five years as the principal grace period. Terms of repayment: annuity payments or by fixed amount payments, consisting of the principal and interest.

Bill No.0167 on the PEM Convention

The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine has adopted a draft bill No.0167 on the accession to the Regional Convention on pan-Euro-Mediterranean preferential rules of origin (PEM Convention). The Convention signed in 2012 allows for the application of diagonal cumulation between the EU, EFTA States, Turkey, the countries which signed the Barcelona Declaration, the Western Balkans and the Faroe Islands. It is based on a network of Free Trade Agreements having identical origin protocols. Those origin protocols are being replaced by a reference to the Regional Convention on pan-Euro-Mediterranean preferential rules of origin (PEM Convention). A single Convention will facilitate the on-going revision of the PEM rules of origin aiming at modernizing and simplifying them.

The 23 Contracting Parties to the PEM Convention are:

  • the EU,
  • the EFTA States (Switzerland, Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein),
  • the Faroe Islands,
  • the participants in the Barcelona Process (Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Palestine (This designation shall not be construed as recognition of a State of Palestine and is without prejudice to the individual positions of the Member States on this issue.), Syria, Tunisia and Turkey),
  • the participants in the EU's Stabilisation and Association Process (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Kosovo (This designation is without prejudice to positions on status, and is in line with UNSCR 1244 and the ICJ Opinion on the Kosovo Declaration of Independence.),
  • the Republic of Moldova; with Georgia in progress.

The PEM Convention will ultimately replace the network of about 60 bilateral protocols on rules of origin in force in the pan-Euro-Med zone with a single legal instrument. The main objective of the PEM Convention is to allow for a more effective management of the system of pan-Euro-Med cumulation of origin by enabling the Contracting Parties to better react to rapidly changing economic realities. A single legal instrument may indeed be amended more easily than a complex network of protocols and should pave the way towards the long expected adaptation of the pan-Euro-Med rules of origin to the current market conditions.
The PEM Convention will also better integrate the participants in the European Union's Stabilisation and Association Process (the EU's SAP) into the Pan-Euro-Med system of cumulation of origin, by creating a single zone in which diagonal cumulation can apply. This step offers new trade opportunities. In particular, it allows for the application of diagonal cumulation involving at the same time the EU, EFTA States and participants in the EU's SAP.

Background

The pan-European cumulation system was created in 1997 on the basis of the EEA agreement (1994) between the EC, the EFTA countries, the CEEC (Central Eastern European Countries) and the Baltic States. It was then widened to Slovenia and to industrial products originating in Turkey (1999).The system was also enlarged to the Faroe Islands.

In 2005, it was enlarged to the participants in the Barcelona Process resulting in the creation of a pan-Euro-Mediterranean cumulation system of origin.

The initiative of creating a single PEM Convention, as an instrument promoting regional integration, was endorsed by the Euro-Mediterranean Trade Ministers during their meeting in Lisbon on 21 October 2007. It includes the above mentioned partners and the Western Balkans participating in the EU's Stabilisation and Association Process.


Then MPs strapped to their work over a bill No.1581d on housing and communal services teeming with amendments. The bill was stood over.

The presiding officer closed the meeting.

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