EN - European Commission - Roundtable "How to strengthen the integration of migrants in urban context?" - Welcome speech by Corina Crețu, Member of the European Commission in charge of Regional Policy, roundtable and family picture with Corina Crețu, Giorgos Kaminis, Mayor of Athens, Eberhard van der Laan, Mayor of Amsterdam, Ada Colau Ballano, Mayor of Barcelona, Hella Dunger-Löper, State Secretary, Representative of the Land of Berlin to the German Federal Government, Colombe Brossel, Deputy Mayor of Paris in charge of Security, Prevention, Urban Policy and Integration, Resul Tapmaz, Deputy Mayor of Gent, and a representative of Leipzig - 05.04.2016 - European Commission, Brussels. Corina Crețu: "Dear Mayors and Vice-Mayors, Distinguished guests, Ladies and gentlemen, Good morning! I would like to warmly welcome you all to Brussels. I appreciate your availability and responding positively to my invitation. I wanted to have a personal discussion with you on the challenges you face in the integration of migrants. The barbaric attacks of last 22 March make your presence here in Brussels an even greater symbol of solidarity among people in the European Union. An even greater symbol of unity, in the defence of our common values: freedom, tolerance and progress for everybody, wherever she or he comes from. So thank you very much for being here, in these moments, as we really need to have a political discussion on managing integration of migrants in the long-term. To express our solidarity with the victims I would like to ask you for a minute of silence. Thank you very much! Ladies and gentlemen, these are certainly not easy times to speak about Europe and integration of migrants into our cities. But it is my firmest belief that Europe is more necessary than ever. I strongly believe that no Member State can cope alone with this. These are truly historic moments. It is an unprecedented migration to our countries. And most of these migrants are here to stay. Behind the word 'migrants' there are people, individual lives And we care about them. For instance the 10 000 unaccompanied children need to be a priority. We also care about the inhabitants of our cities in dealing with this. Migration is a European challenge, and therefore better addressed, if all Europeans are involved in the solutions. In particular if all European cities are involved in the solutions. Because migration is largely an urban reality. Each of you at city level is confronted, every day, with concrete challenges involving migration. Shelter, education, employment; you are actually at the forefront of the EU response to these challenges. Of course, in the first place, focus on short-term action is unavoidable. But you all know that the most effective solution is to work in the long term. And this means turning the migration challenge into an opportunity for everybody. This means working all together to give these people a future in our societies. None of us is ready to accept the development of parallel societies. On the contrary, we can reasonably expect this people to help us better address our toughest challenges as part of our societies here in Europe. And the only way to achieve this objective is to work on the effective integration of migrants. This is, ladies and gentlemen, the experience of many people. People, who were once offered an opportunity in a foreign country, made progress in life and gave back to the society what they had previously received. Furthermore, this is also the experience we have, from our thousands of social inclusion projects. There is so much we can learn from each other. For example, in Brussels, we have just supported a co-working space in Molenbeek, which is helping to create jobs, but also promoting social diversity by attracting new people to the neighbourhood. We are also in discussion with Brussels' authorities for more contribution to social inclusion through our policy. I also myself visited some projects in Berlin, Paris or Athens that already change life of people who arrived there. As Robert Schuman once said, Europe will not be made all at once, but will be built through concrete achievements, which first create a de facto solidarity. With your concrete achievements at local level, you are building the Europe of tomorrow. From our side, we are absolutely keen to support you in your efforts. Our Funds are ready to support you in promoting integration, by financing projects in social and education infrastructure, housing, childcare, health, job creation. Over 2014-2020, 15 billion euros of cohesion policy are now directly managed by urban areas. The forthcoming EU Urban Agenda will provide further help. As you may know, one of its first Partnerships focuses on integration of refugees and migrants. (...)" Full text here: goo.gl/svV5I4 © Frédérick Moulin 2016 - EU2016 - European Commission - All rights reserved.

• published: 06 Apr 2016
• views: 6