COMECE on Common European Values

Enclosed you will find a declaration 'Common values – the living source of the European project' of the Member Bishops of the COMECE signed on 24 November 2006 and sent today (11 December) to the heads of Member States and to European Authorities.Full text of the news in Czech: HERE.

Brussels (B): The declaration was signed at the end of the COMECE plenary assembly on 22-24 November 2006 in Brussels and its aim is to remind the European Heads of State and Government and the presidents of the European Commission and the European Parliament of the values and ambitions of Europe, the contents of the political declaration to be adopted on 25 March 2007 in Berlin.

The declaration 'Common values – the living source of the European project' was sent today to Matti Vanhanen, Finnish Prime Minister and President of the European Council, Angela Merkel, German Chancellor and President of the European Council from January 2007, José Barroso, President of the European Commission, Josep Borrell, President or the European Parliament, and Hans-Gert Pöttering, President of the European People's Party – European Democrats (EPP-ED) Group.

The COMECE Bishops recall the basis for the protection of human rights, the rule of law, solidarity, subsidiarity and democracy, which is the respect of human dignity. They also underline the need to build Europe on a firm community of values which must be revived in view of the new transnational challenges and remind the Christian and humanistic sources of the common values of the EU that should be mentioned in the Berlin Declaration.