Governance and citizenship

The president of the Council of European Municipalities and Regions (CEMR), and mayor of Vienna, Michael Häupl, has welcomed the Berlin Declaration adopted by the heads of state and government of the EU on 25 March 2007.

 

In the Declaration, the leaders of EU's Member States state: We preserve in the European Union the identities and diverse traditions of its Member States. We are enriched by open borders and a lively variety of languages, cultures and regions. There are many goals which we cannot achieve on our own, but only in concert. Tasks are shared between the European Union, the Member States and their regions and local authorities.

 

End December 2006, the president of CEMR and his counterparts from five other associations of European local and regional governments wrote to the German Chancelor Angela Merkel, to ask her that the Berlin Declaration include positive references to the principle of local and regional self-government, as well as the role that these levels of government play in the democratic life of the Union and in support of the aims of closer European integration.

 

The full text of the Berlin Declaration (in 23 languages)

 

CEMR declaration on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Rome Treaty

 

The letter from the associations of local and regional governments to Angela Merkel