WRITTEN QUESTION No. 2593/97 by Katerina DASKALAKI to the Commission. Fires in Greece
30. 4. 98 EN Official Journal of the European Communities C 134/13 (98/C 134/17) WRITTEN QUESTION E-2574/97 by Nikitas Kaklamanis (UPE) to the Commission (24 July 1997) Subject: Contemptuous and dangerous decisions by the new Turkish Government The Turkish Minister for Agriculture has officially stated that the area of opium cultivation in Turkey will increase from the present area of 300 000 ha. to 700 000 ha. : the new cultivation sites will be near the towns of Eskisehir and Manisa. In addition to this inflammatory decision, the new Turkish Government, in the person of Vice-President Ecevit, has announced that the government has decided to lift restrictions on transfrontier trade › a measure that concerns primarily trade between Turkey and Iraq and is in flagrant violation of all the relevant UN resolutions. Will the Commission say how it intends to react to these actions by the official Turkish authorities which show contempt for resolutions of organisations such as the UN, ignore appeals by governments, including the US administration which has repeatedly called for the cultivation of opium to be halted, and show indifference towards the deaths of hundreds of young Europeans every year from drug abuse? Answer given by Mr Van den Broek on behalf of the Commission (31 October 1997) Turkey is one of the countries given permission by the United Nations to grow opium. The Turkish authorities intend to increase the area under opium to 80 000 hectares in 1998 › not to 700 000 hectares as stated by the Honourable Member. As it is obliged to, Turkey (Ministry of Foreign Affairs) on 14 July instructed its representative to the United Nations, in Vienna, to inform the United Nations Drug Control Programme of the area to be used for growing opium in 1998. The Turkish authorities have, furthermore, informed the Commission that trade between Turkey and Iraq complies with the limits under the United Nations’ embargo on Iraq and that no contrary decision has been reached. (98/C 134/18) WRITTEN QUESTION E-2593/97 by Katerina Daskalaki (UPE) to the Commission (29 July 1997) Subject: Fires in Greece In recent years, large areas of public forest in Greece have been incinerated during the summer months, destroying Europeís Mediterranean ecosystem. Early in July, the Sheik-Sou forest constituting the Thessaloniki green belt was destroyed by fire, while incalculable fire damage also occurred in Ilia, Messinia, the island of Ios and elsewhere. Almost every case has revealed the lack of a planned response to the outbreak of fires and failure to maintain fire-fighting aircraft in a state of readiness. In addition, forest land destroyed by fire has been declassified and subsequently built upon and redeveloped, which is quite unacceptable. Given that, within the EU, Greece is the Member State with the largest areas of forest land destroyed by fire, can the Commission provide the following information: In addition to essential financial assistance, will the Commission (in accordance with the EP resolutions of 29 September 1994 (1) and 21 September 1995 (2), review the effectiveness of the measures taken by the Member State in question? What steps can it take to ensure that, within the framework of environmental protection in the EU, forest land damaged by fire is not used for redevelopment, that reafforestation is made compulsory and that Member States failing to comply are censured?