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Brussels presents latest proposals on spending spare EU money

Business Materials 28 January 2009 17:55 (UTC +04:00)

The European Commission on Wednesday presented a detailed list of projects for improving energy security and spreading the use of the internet in a fresh bid to convince member states to spend 5 billion euros (6.6 billion dollars) in unused EU funds.

Officials in Brussels say the investments will also provide a much needed shot-in-the-arm to the bloc's economy, which is suffering from one of its worst recessions in decades, reported dpa.

The bulk of the money - 3.5 billion euros - is to go on linking up the member states' electricity grids, building gas pipelines, creating wind farms and pumping polluting carbon dioxide underground.

For instance, 250 million euros are to go to Nabucco, a 3,300-kilometre pipeline linking Central Asia to Austria, with a further 150 million going to a pipeline linking Turkey, Greece and Italy.

Officials say these kinds of investments are all the more necessary in the wake of the Russia-Ukraine gas standoff, which cut supplies to much of Europe for nearly two weeks. The EU currently imports about a quarter of the gas that it needs from Russia via Ukrainian pipelines.

"We need to learn the lessons of the recent gas crisis and invest heavily in energy," European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said.

A further 1 billion euros are to be spent on spreading high-speed internet connections to rural areas, with the remaining 0.5 billion destined for environmentally-friendly projects in the countryside.

Barroso said the projects would "stimulate the European economy" and help "build a stronger Europe for the future".

EU governments agreed in principle to use the extra billions from the EU budget at a summit in December, but asked the commission to come forward with a detailed list of projects before giving it their formal backing.

However, EU diplomats have given Wednesday's list a lukewarm reception, with some complaining that they were not getting their fair share of the pie.

The EU's biggest contributor, Germany, has long complained that any unspent EU money should be returned to member states.

Greenpeace, an environment pressure group, accused the EU of not spending enough money on creating an environmentally sustainable energy system.

"Today's money for clean energy pales in comparison to the hundreds of billions of euros that have been made available by EU countries to confront the economic recession," said Greenpeace's Frauke Thies.

The commission expects its latest proposals to be discussed by foreign ministers meeting in Brussels on February 23, ahead of its final adoption at the bloc's spring summit.

But officials are braced for a rocky ride.

Referring to December's discussions, commission spokesman Johannes Laitenberger said: "It is no secret that there were difficult discussions among member states."

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