Von der Leyen: Portuguese presidency ‘incredibly successful’ despite pandemic

The President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, on Monday called the Portuguese presidency of the Council of the European Union (EU), during the first half of this year, “incredibly successful”, despite the difficulties related to the pandemic.

The Prime Minister, António Costa, today presides over a ceremony to take stock of the Portuguese presidency of the Council of the European Union, with the Minister of Foreign Affairs and the Secretary of State for European Affairs, Ana Paula Zacarias.

In a video message broadcast on the occasion, Ursula von der Leyen thanked António Costa “for an incredibly successful presidency” and “for all the work done”.

“I want to highlight that, during this pandemic, some topics would not have been as successful without your presidency, such as for example the vaccination strategy” against Covid-19, she pointed out.

“I remember very well that I said that we have to start together on 27 December. And we did it and we went through all the difficulties together and this is where you see whether or not there is a team when going through difficulties”.

At a time when an average of more than 60% of the adult EU population has received at least one dose of vaccine and close to 40% are fully vaccinated, Ursula von der Leyen said it was now possible to “reap the rewards together” of the inoculation strategy.

Since last Thursday, the Covid-19 digital certificate is already in force in the EU, proving testing, recovery or vaccination, created to facilitate movement within the EU, and whose collaboration of Portugal for its implementation was also highlighted by the leader of the EU executive.

In her message, Ursula von der Leyen pointed out the “record time” to implement the document.

Also in “record time” was the decision to ratify the own resources, which gave the European Commission the go-ahead to go to the markets and start raising money to finance the post-crisis economic recovery fund, she said.

“Normally, if we look at the other own resources decisions that are ratified, it takes on average about two years, so you have done it in five months. Thank you”, concluded Ursula von der Leyen.

Under the title “Review of the Portuguese presidency of the Council of the EU”, the ceremony took place at the Belém Cultural Centre in Lisbon, with video messages also from the presidents of the European Parliament, David Sassoli, and the European Council, Charles Michel.

The fourth Portuguese presidency of the EU ended on June 30, handing over to Slovenia, which will lead the Council of the EU for the next six months.

The Portuguese presidency ended on Wednesday with the Recovery Summit, organised by the Finance Ministry, which brought together European ministers, commissioners, MEPs and experts in Lisbon to discuss reform of the European economy after the pandemic and the EU’s economic governance model.

At the summit of European leaders on June 24 and 25, António Costa presented before his counterparts an assessment of the Portuguese presidency, stressing that Portugal had fulfilled the motto that he defined as “Time to act”: “It was time to act and we acted,” he said.