Doc. 9592

14 October 2002

Promotion of mountainous regions in Europe

Motion for a resolution

presented by Mr Maissen and others

This motion has not been discussed in the Assembly and commits only the members who have signed it

      The UN has declared 2002 "International Year of the Mountains". Mountain areas represent about twenty-five percent of the surface of the earth above sea level. Even if merely ten percent of the world population lives in these areas, half of mankind relies on them for the drinking water they produce. Mountain regions are of utmost importance regarding habitat, economy, recreation and nature, and basic cultural and social values are related to them. With the extension to forty-four of the number of member countries of the Council of Europe in the last few years, the proportion of states with mountainous areas has consequently increased. The Caucasus, the Ural, the "Erzebirge" and "Riesengebirge", the Rhodope and the Carpathian mountains have thus joined the Alps, the Jura, the "Massif central", the Pyrenees, the Abruzzi/Apenine system and other mountain ranges within the boundaries of the Council of Europe. In many of these areas the population must cope with extremely precarious political and socio-economic living conditions.

      The Assembly decides,

      - to concretely take up the situation in the mountainous areas as well as the concerns related to the promotion of such areas in the member states,

      - to propose measures which will secure, in the longer term, the existential foundations for habitat, economy and leisure according to the principles of sustainable development, emphasising the social and environmental features and the basic rules of equal opportunity and participative self-determination.

Signed (see overleaf)

Signed:1

Maissen, Switzerland, EPP

Burataeva, Russia, EDG

Cousin, France, NR

Frunda, Romania, EPP

Gatterer, Austria, EPP

Gross, Switzerland, SOC

Gubert, Italy, EPP

Kroll, Poland, EPP

Mintas-Hodak, Croatia, EPP

Topalli, Albania, EPP

van der Linden, Netherlands, EPP

Zapfl-Helbling, Switzerland, EPP

1 .       SOC: Socialist Group

      EPP: Group of the European People’s Party

      EDG: European Democratic Group

      LDR : Liberal, Democratic and Reformers’ Group

      UEL: Group of the Unified European Left

      NR: not registered in a group