Co-financing operations with European non-governmental development organisations (NGOs) in fields of interest to the developing countries

In its common position on the proposal for a regulation on co-financing operations with NGOs in developing countries, the Council accepted the bulk of the Commission's proposals concerning the nature of the operations to be financed. However, the Council highlighted certain issues, particularly: - the type of operations that could be co-financed: it added to the operations already provided for those operations involving the protection of threatened cultures (especially endangered indigenous cultures), - the establishment of criteria to determine whether a proposed operation was suitable for co-financing: these criteria included both the projects and the nature of the NGO seeking co-financing, - the establishment of maximum limits for co-financing (50% of the total cost or 75% of total contributions), - a mechanism for the evaluation of operations, - the decision-making procedure: the Council proposed that projects and programmes exceeding ECU 2 million would be adopted in accordance with the IIb procedure of the decision on committee procedure, while the annual general guidelines and the revision of the general conditions (on access to co-financing) would be adopted in accordance with the IIa procedure. Finally, the Council took over a few of the amendments adopted by the European Parliament at first reading. These included, in particular, the amendment on the protection and improvement of the situation of children in developing countries. �