Moldovan parliament monitors implementation of Association Agreement

Chisinau, 20 October /MOLDPRES/ - The parliament monitors the degree of implementation of the provisions of the Association Agreement, the parliament’s communication and public relations department has reported.  

The present progress and challenges were unveiled at a meeting of the Parliamentary Council for European Integration, chaired by Deputy Parliament Speaker Iurie Leanca. The MPs heard the reports presented by the cabinet.  

“When we go to Strasbourg, to the Meeting of the Parliamentary Association Committee, we are to objectively know what are the achievements and the problems. It is important that we have a more productive relation with EU and that the present suspicions disappear; therefore, the parliament will boost the monitoring process,” said the head of the Parliamentary Council for European Integration, Iurie Leanca.   

Deputy Foreign Affairs and European Integration Minister Daniela Morari referred punctually to the actions undertaken to implement the reforms’ agenda, unveiled at the Meeting of the Moldova-European Union Association Committee on 19 October. According to the official, the degree of implementation is 76 per cent and on the next period, the authorities are set to extend, at the online level, the reporting on the implementation of the Association Agreement.    

For his part, the director of the Reforms Implementation Centre, Iurie Ciocan, said that the draft on amendment of the legislation concerning the public administration reform had been given final touches and was to be submitted to parliament for consideration on the next period.

According to Deputy Economics and Infrastructure Minister Vitalie Iurcu, the Third Energy Package, earlier passed in parliament, was fully transposed and the secondary legislation is to be worked out by the government and the National Energy Regulatory Agency till mid-2018. Representatives of the Economics Ministry said that they had asked EU to increase the export quotas for more categories of Moldovan fruits.

The deputy governor of the National Bank of Moldova (BNM), Cristina Harea, presented the situation in the banking sector, the latest developments in cooperation with the International Monetary Fund and in the process of investigating the bank fraud. The parliament approved the Basel III package, which provides for the approximation of the banking legislation to the EU standards. The draft law on banks’ activity has been recently passed by the parliament and is to enter into force as of 1 January 2018, thus replacing the stipulations related to the regulation and supervision of banks from the Law on financial institutions. BNM continues elaborating draft secondary normative acts, in order to enforce the new banking law, and at present, the draft law on additional supervision of banks is considered by the parliament.      

The participants in the meeting heard reports on cooperation in the sectors of energy, trade and economy between Moldova and the European Union, aspects on fighting corruption and justice reform.   

The meeting of the Parliamentary Council for European Integration is a preparatory one for the fifth meeting of the Moldova – EU Association Parliamentary Committee, due in Strasbourg on 25-26 October 2017. Iurie Leanca said that the next meeting of the Council would be held after the Strasbourg meeting, and would be focused on Moldova’s goals for the Eastern Partnership Summit, due in Brussels in next November.     

The goal of the Parliamentary Council for European Integration, set up in 2016, is to ensure a mechanism of communication, coordination, consultation and cooperation in the process of Moldova’s European integration and adjusting the national legislation to the EU one.