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State Secretary Hans Winkler took part today as Council Presidency in the first informal trilogue on the establishment of the European Fundamental Rights Agency with the European Commission and the European Parliament.

"We have said from the outset that the establishment of an independent and effective agency, which we hope to see become operational from 1.1.2007, is essential for the credibility of protection of fundamental rights in Europe. We want to achieve this in particular by independence in reporting and through the establishment of an independent scientific council”, Winkler said. He stressed that the basic structure of the agency was in place. "This will not be changed." Where differences of opinion persist, for example regarding the geographical scope of the agency, parts of the organisational structure and possible agency competence under the third pillar, solutions will be sought through dialogue with all the parties.

Winkler said the agency would mainly concern itself with the Member States of the European Union, but that it also appeared appropriate to extend its geographical scope to the candidate countries (Croatia, Macedonia and Turkey) in order to ensure they are already conforming to EU standards on their path towards the EU. An extension to the remaining countries of the Western Balkans is currently under discussion.

The future competence of the agency in the third pillar is still under negotiation. Winkler stressed that many Member States considered it was very important to have a strong agency that also had a mandate under the third pillar in order to achieve the goal of improving EU policy in the area of fundamental rights.

Winkler said there was broad consensus in the Council on the need to involve the Council of Europe in the agency’s work and that there had to be clear delimitation of competences. He rejected inappropriate, emotional criticism of the agency. "The human rights monitoring function is the exclusive competence of the Council of Europe. The agency will be a new central EU contact point on human rights issues. The limits lie in the application of Community law. The agency’s task will be to provide expertise and information to the EU institutions and Member States as a basis for their decisions."

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