92002E2742

WRITTEN QUESTION E-2742/02

by Emmanouil Bakopoulos (GUE/NGL) to the Commission

(30 September 2002)

Subject: Absence of Greek from Inforegio website

The Inforegio website offers visitors a very interesting opportunity to read about the achievements of regional policy in each Member State. The page on Greece, however, (http://www.europa.eu.int/comm/regional_policy/projects/stories/search.cfm) offers no Greek language option, which means that Greek readers have to resort to another language to obtain information about their own country.

Can the Commission state the reasons for such a serious omission? Will the Commission in future also provide such information in Greek?

Answer given by Mr Barnier on behalf of the Commission

(4 November 2002)

The Inforegio website devoted to the Union's regional policy was run by a private firm until last February but has now been transferred to the Europa server of the Commission, which is endeavouring subject to resource availability and technical constraints to increase the number of documents put on line in all the Union's official languages. The good practice examples presented on the Inforegio site to which the Honourable Member refers will be published in Greek within the next few months and a further set of examples will be published directly in Greek in spring 2003. The Commission will mark Greece's six-month presidency of the Council by publishing these examples in a brochure on Structural Fund action in Greece.