Thursday

28th Mar 2024

EU launches new fund to help oppressed

Pro-democracy movements in oppressive states like Belarus will soon have access to grants through a new Brussels-based fund.

Officially launched on Wednesday (9 January), the European Endowment for Democracy (EED) is a joint undertaking by the European Commission and a handful of member states and European deputies.

Read and decide

Join EUobserver today

Get the EU news that really matters

Instant access to all articles — and 20 years of archives. 14-day free trial.

... or subscribe as a group

“The endowment comes at a very timely moment, as 2013 will be a crucial year for democratic transitions, in particular in the EU’s neighbourhood,” said the EU’s foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton.

The EED signed an initial €6.2 million contract with the commission in September last year. Switzerland and a handful of other member states committed an additional €8 million.

Another €10 million from the commission is expected over the next three years, reports Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza.

The fund is designed to bypass the more heavy administrative procedures attached to EU grant-giving and is open to journalists, bloggers, non-registered NGOs, and political movements – even in exile.

EU enlargement commissioner Stefan Fuele said the EED will aid “the emerging players that face obstacles in accessing European Union funding.”

For her part, Nasta Palazhanka, one of the leader’s of the Belarus Youth Front, told EUobserver in Minsk in late 2011 that EU support would be critical to a movement whose leadership is under constant KGB surveillance or in jail.

“The more your popularity and your reputation grows, the more the repression increases,” she said.

The fund is the brainchild of Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski who initially proposed it in February 2011.

Movements in Algeria, Armenia, the Palestinian Authority, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Egypt, Georgia, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Moldova, Syria and Ukraine will have access to the endowment.

But with neighbouring Poland’s state secretary Jerzy Pomianowski at its helm, the EED may take on a distinctively eastern focus.

A career diplomat and statesman, Pomianowski was himself an active member of the democratic opposition movement in Poland during the 1980s.

He also directed a joint initiative of the Paris-based OECD and the United Nations to support public administrations in countries destabilised by armed conflict or natural disasters.

Opinion

Belarus as a permanent challenge for the EU

A new project for economic integration proposed by Russia's prime minister to create a Eusian Union based on the Customs Union of Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus is a major challenge for the European Union.

Ukraine slams grain trade restrictions at EU summit

Restrictions on Ukrainian agricultural exports to the EU could translate into military losses in their bid to stop Russia's war, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky warned EU leaders during their summit in Brussels on Thursday.

Difficult talks ahead on financing new EU defence spending

With the war in Ukraine showing no signs of ending any time soon, EU leaders will meet in Brussels on Thursday and Friday (21 and 22 March) to discuss how to boost the defence capabilities of Ukraine and of the bloc itself.

Opinion

Why UK-EU defence and security deal may be difficult

Rather than assuming a pro-European Labour government in London will automatically open doors in Brussels, the Labour party needs to consider what it may be able to offer to incentivise EU leaders to factor the UK into their defence thinking.

Latest News

  1. Kenyan traders react angrily to proposed EU clothes ban
  2. Lawyer suing Frontex takes aim at 'antagonistic' judges
  3. Orban's Fidesz faces low-polling jitters ahead of EU election
  4. German bank freezes account of Jewish peace group
  5. EU Modernisation Fund: an open door for fossil gas in Romania
  6. 'Swiftly dial back' interest rates, ECB told
  7. Moscow's terror attack, security and Gaza
  8. Why UK-EU defence and security deal may be difficult

Stakeholders' Highlights

  1. Nordic Council of MinistersJoin the Nordic Food Systems Takeover at COP28
  2. Nordic Council of MinistersHow women and men are affected differently by climate policy
  3. Nordic Council of MinistersArtist Jessie Kleemann at Nordic pavilion during UN climate summit COP28
  4. Nordic Council of MinistersCOP28: Gathering Nordic and global experts to put food and health on the agenda
  5. Friedrich Naumann FoundationPoems of Liberty – Call for Submission “Human Rights in Inhume War”: 250€ honorary fee for selected poems
  6. World BankWorld Bank report: How to create a future where the rewards of technology benefit all levels of society?

Join EUobserver

EU news that matters

Join us