Romania's Vincze appointed LIBE permanent rapporteur on new EU-UK collaboration framework

MEP Vincze Lorant has been appointed as permanent rapporteur by the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE) of the European Parliament for the negotiations on the new EU-UK collaboration framework. "I was recommended by the EPP group of the LIBE Committee because this file belongs to our political group and I was asked by the group coordinator to take over this file due to my knowledge of English and my ability to negotiate. Basically, I will be a permanent rapporteur. Until the end of the negotiations, my role will be to defend European citizens and, of course, of particular interest to us are the Romanian citizens who are in the United Kingdom, so that they enjoy the same rights they had while the United Kingdom was an EU member state. We will also have to find a good solution for those who will want to leave for the UK in the future, but it is already a question that has to make us all think. What is our interest? Do we want even more people leaving for the UK or are we trying to make policies to keep them here? The rights of the citizens of the European Union in the United Kingdom and those of the United Kingdom living in the EU must be observed," Vincze told AGERPRES. According to the MEP, legal and security co-operation, which he wants to be as strong as possible, is among his concerns, as the anti-terrorist fight will not stop at the borders, and through Eurojust co-operation numerous cross-border cases have been resolved. Vincze said that there are some basic principles of the EU that must be taken into account, and one is that according to the new collaboration framework, the United Kingdom cannot enjoy the same rights that it had as an EU member. "The most important thing is what will happen in this new environment with the mobility of citizens, which is, in fact, the starting point of Brexit. We must say that nothing has happened so far, either in the UK or in the EU. The EU has to complete negotiations for the new relation framework by December, which may be extended by a year or two, but that must be agreed by June. The four elements of free movement - of persons, goods, services and capital - have the same weight, they cannot be without each other. This principle outlines some negotiation lines that are important from the point of view of the European Parliament," said Vincze. The MEP said that in the negotiations, a partnership formula must be found as far as security actions, data protection, asylum, migration and borders policy are concerned, as solutions are needed to replace the way the current system works. "There will be a permanent course in the coming year as the European Commission reports periodically, and in the end there will be a resolution, an EP report that will contain each chapter - for example, as far as fishery co-operation goes, the fishery commission will follow what's going on," the MEP said. He says there are many issues that need to be regulated in this unique case in the history of the European Union and that negotiations are unlikely to be completed by the end of the year. "I believe that they will introduce visas for EU citizens, at least in the first phase, as things are foreshadowed now, it will be an opportunity to stay visa-free for 90-days for travel purposes, but after that you will need a visa. What happens to scholarships, what happens to investors, to the Erasmus programme, where obviously the UK universities were a magnet for students on the continent, and it would be a pity for something that worked very well to be destroyed. There are very specific issues to be answered. There has never been such a situation before," said Vincze Lorant. AGERPRES (RO - author: Dorina Matis, editor: Diana Dumitru; EN - author: Corneliu-Aurelian Colceriu, editor: Adina Panaitescu)

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