European Union News - Internal Market

The European Commission confirmed that on 5 March, Latvia formally asked the Commission to deliver an extraordinary convergence report with the aim of joining the euro from 1st January 2014. The report will assess if the country has achieved the five convergence criteria as defined in the Maastricht Treaty for joining the euro.

According to a Flash Eurobarometer survey published by the European Commission, EU holiday makers, as many as 88% spent their vacations somewhere within the EU, either in their own country or in another Member State. Spain (12%), Italy (8%) and France (7%) are still the most preferred destinations.

The political agreement reached between the Council and the European Parliament on the so-called "CRD 4" package was endorsed by the Council. The package contains two proposals set out to amend and replace existing capital requirement directives: a regulation establishing prudential requirements that institutions need to respect, and a directive governing access to deposit-taking activities.

The Eurogroup welcomed in a statement the achievement of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) milestone for February, agreed between Greece and the Troika. The Eurogroup also welcomed the disbursement by the EFSF of €2.8 billion under the second economic adjustment programme. With regard to Cyprus, with the new government now in place in Cyprus, the Eurogroup is confident that a swift conclusion of the negotiations towards a Memorandum of Understanding can be reached.

The European Commission announced the signature of an agreement between the EU and Canada to cooperate more closely to ensure the security of their supply chains. The Agreement builds on the existing customs cooperation agreement with Canada and extends it to include supply chain security and related risk management matters.

The President of the Committee of the Regions (CoR), Ramón Luis Valcárcel Siso, highlighted during a conference held in Dublin that it is extremely important to involve local and regional authorities in delivering the new "Youth Guarantee" scheme to answer to the youth unemployment challenge. He also pointed out that cities and regions are key to creating workforce that meets needs of labour market.

On 3 March, the new EU Timber regulation that prohibits the placing of illegally harvested timber on the European market in an effort to tackle the problem of illegal logging across the world, entered into force.

The trade agreement concluded with Peru in 2012 provisionally applies from 1 of March 2013. According to the European Commission, the Agreement will open up markets for both EU and Peruvian exporters eventually bringing annual savings of more than €500 million. The Commission also stressed that Colombia is expected to join the implementation phase later this year.

The European Commission proposed a new industrial policy for the European space sector, and to set up a European satellite collision avoidance system. With these measures, it intends to face the increasing competition from emerging industrial actors in countries such as China and India - competition posing a challenge to the further development of the EU's industry.

The European Commission welcomed the European Court of Justice (ECJ)'s judgments which confirmed that Hungary and Spain have failed to comply with their obligations under EU law in the field of rail transport. On the other hand, Austrian and German rail transport legislation complies with EU law ruled in favour of the European. Although the Commission respects the Court's interpretation of the current law, it remains convinced that a more effective separation between an infrastructure manager and other rail operations is essential to ensure non-discriminatory access for all operators to the rail tracks, and thus to stimulate growth in the rail sector.