Kristian Vigenin (S&D). – (BG) Mr President, Baroness Ashton, ladies and gentlemen, I wish to express how pleased I am that the European External Action Service is already taking real shape and that it will be fully up and running as an organisation very soon.

Just six months ago, quite a few fellow Members expressed doubts as to whether Catherine Ashton, High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and Vice-President of the European Commission, would be able to tackle the challenges presented by the new post, entrusted with considerable powers, as well as considerable responsibilities.

I think that time has refuted these doubts and Baroness Ashton has managed, in an extremely skilful way, to create the foundations of the new service, which I wish to congratulate her on. We must also give the European Parliament its due. It has chosen, from the very outset, an approach based on cooperation, which I hope we will also observe when we adopt the amendments in the Financial Regulation and Staff Regulations.

One of the most contentious topics was, and still remains, the one referred to as ‘geographical balance’. In other words, the fair representation of Member States. This issue mainly concerns new Member States, which are still greatly undervalued, in terms of both numbers of representatives and positions in the hierarchy. I myself come from such a country and I can assure you that we will be making a mistake if we fail to preserve a high degree of sensitivity to this issue. This is the only way we will guarantee that all European citizens will feel that they are adequately represented in the new service.

At the same time, I call on the diplomatic services in the new Member States to adopt measures aimed at obtaining additional qualifications and training, when necessary, so that they field competitive candidates. Finally, I would like clear guarantees given as of right now that no misuse will be tolerated, in any way, of positions in the diplomatic service for resolving purely national problems to the detriment of the European Union’s long-term objectives and interests.