Needs and Possibilities for Establishment of Cooperation in the Light of Existing Political, Economic and Environmental Factors

by Edita Stojić-Karanović, Prof Dr.^[1]

introductory paper at the XII International Conference "Danube - River of Cooperation" (October, 11-14 2001)

In the name of the International Scientific Forum "Danube - River of Cooperation", I would like to thank to all of distinguished guests and participants of the Twelfth Conference for supporting our work and taking part in it. Your contribution in the work of this Danube Forum is very important today, and it was crucial in the past twelve years. Without that we would not succeed, and our organisation and projects could not even survive. With your work in the past we got recognition of important international organisations and got accreditation to the Global Environment Facility. The success of the International Scientific Forum "Danube - River of Cooperation" is very much your success, too.

Today we start with a new hope that the basic goals which with we started our project of Danubian cooperation at the First conference "Danube - River of Cooperation" in 1989 could be fulfilled with more success, than in the period behind us. We defined those goals upon our long research activities. They convinced us that international cooperation and regional integration should be based on economic, social and environmental interests, as well as on interests to achieve undisturbed cultural development of all peoples and individuals - inhabitants of the Danube region and the neighboring regions. We hope, after the huge changes in Europe and in our country we could renew our struggle for international cooperation on regional, interregional and global level with more success.

It is also very important, that there are developed at European and global level new forms of international cooperation which have to be implemented now into the Danube- and neighboring regions. The aim of regional cooperation remain to be the fulfillment of mutual interests of all the nations living around a common natural resource, in our case it is the Danube. Now, we should use all the possibilities offered by documents of the Organization of United Nations and the European Community, from the "Local Agenda 21" to the idea and practice of Euro-regions.

We just started the project of establishing international Cooperation of Municipalities along the river Danube in accordance with the Local Agenda 21. The first steps started with Municipality of Grocka. And I would like to thank the Lady Mayor Vesna Ivic, for her initiative.

Formation of a new Euro-region in the Djerdap area was proposed at our former conferences by Romanian, Bulgarian and Serbian participants. Upon our former project proposal on "Lower Danube Cooperation", first came the project proposal of Eng. Ilie Chincea for a common national park in Ðerdap region. From his contribution to the tenth conference "Danube - River of Cooperation" is the following map:

The "Ðerdap Euro-region" should be established on the same Ðerdap circle, but on a broader territory involving the tree neighbouring countries. For the realisation of this idea there is a huge work ahead us. For it we need the promotion work from influential personalities, as well as the research work of all of us.

The first influential personality for this mission, who in the same time was with us from the beginning of the project "Danube - River of Cooperation" is Mr. Predrag Simić, now the Foreign Policy Adviser of the president of Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.

So, I am asking professor Simić to take the floor and to give us again one of his inspirational speeches with which he will open the work of our Conference today.

[1] Founder - President of the International Scientific Forum "Danube - River of Cooperation"
Scientific counsellor at the Institute of International Politics and Economics (IIPE), Belgrade, SCG.

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