Though the effort to carry out the national plan of action for implementing the EU-Moldova Association Agreement for 2015-2016 doubled at the start of this year, especially by removing a number of shortcomings witnessed in 2015, the general implementation rate is relatively low, below 50%, it is said in the Declaration of civil society representatives issued on the occasion of the second meeting of the EU-Moldova Parliamentary Association Committee, IPN reports.

According to civil society, the shortcomings accumulated owing to the political crises, poor institutional capacities of the authorities and mainly because of a reduced political will last year. Consequently, many of the commitments assumed by the authorities risk not being fully fulfilled by the end of this year.

“The Moldovan authorities and the European External Action Service of the European Union plan to negotiate a new Association Agenda for 2017-2019, which is to be agreed by this yearend. The new Association Agenda will form the basis of the new plan of action for implementing the Association Agreement. In this regard, we ask that the opinions of civil society organizations should be consulted within the negotiations on the Association Agenda so as to better prioritize the implementation of the Association Agreement, taking into account the previous experience,” reads the Declaration.

Thus, civil society considers that it is important for the Association Agenda and the new plan of action to be better structured, with short-, medium- and long-term priorities, while the measures should be concrete, and measurable, with objective indicators for assessing the progress. It is also important to ensure greater transparency in the process of making decisions concerning the Association Agenda. In this regard, the SCOs call on the EU-Moldova Parliamentary Association Committee to amend its regulations and ensure the public is informed about the subjects that are to be discussed in the meetings, while civil society representatives are invited as rapporteurs or observers to these.

The Declaration was signed by the Legal Resources Center of Moldova, the Institute for European Politics and Reforms, the Analytical Center “Expert-Grup”, the Independent Journalism Center, the Association “Promo-Lex”, the Partnership for Development Center, Terra-1530, Transparency International Moldova, East Europe Foundation, the Association for Participatory Democracy, etc.