mr president in all fairness i believe the swedish presidency can be satisfied with its achievements and i think that sweden can be proud of the performance of the swedish presidency
however as always with the short-term presidencies when they are good they leave us with a bitter feeling of a somehow unaccomplished job
therefore i believe the most important question now is how and what could we further build on the achievements of the swedish presidency
the first thing is the implementation of the lisbon treaty
a treaty is never enough for solving a problem
political will is always needed in order to enhance it properly but in this case i think that we need even more than will
we need courage and imagination imagination to fill the gaps or to clarify the ambiguities of the treaty
therefore i hope that starting with the experience it has accumulated the swedish presidency will still remain involved in supporting the building of the new institution which the lisbon treaty has created namely the permanent or long-term president of the european council and the office of high representative with the external action service
one of the priorities of the swedish presidency was of course the management of the economic and financial crisis
this was very important
against this background i think two phenomena which are quite threatening have been observed firstly the temptation of national protectionism and national egoism and secondly the economic and social disparities between our member states and the lack of economic social and territorial cohesion within the european union
should we call into question the wisdom of enlargement
certainly not
these disparities were already there before and interdependence is valid not only within the union but globally
therefore these disparities were able to undermine or to put in jeopardy the stability of the whole continent and the union
therefore i think that enlargement made it possible for the new member states to cope with these disparities better inside the union for the profit of all members of the union
but the conclusion is as follows and i will end here
i believe that the next step is to pursue bolder and more substantial policies of territorial economic and social cohesion in europe and not fewer policies of this kind together with bold reforms financial and economic reforms which would allow us not to repeat the crisis and certainly with policies for post-crisis rehabilitation
in this context the last statement of the commission concerning economic support for eastern countries as well as the readiness expressed by mr barroso to debate the twenty twenty strategy should be commended
