Rail complaint: Norrbotten has been forgotten, says MEP

Date: 23/10/03

THE European Commission has been accused of leaving the EU's frozen north out in the cold by excluding a key rail project aimed at linking Finland and Sweden with Russia and Norway from its €220 billion list of "Trans European Networks".

A high-level group led by ex-competition commissioner Karel van Miert drew up the list of priority schemes to be completed by 2020.

Projects on the list are expected to attract greater EU funding as part of the growth initiative plan given political support at last week's Brussels summit.

But Swedish Socialist MEP Ewa Hedkvist Petersen said the Commission risks further isolating business and citizens in the region by failing to include the vital Norrbotten rail link in a new "hit-list" of projects that should be given a coveted place in the queue for scarce EU funding.

She said the route between the northern Finnish outpost and neighbouring towns in Sweden and beyond, into Norway and Russia, is "a missing link".

"Distances for transport in northern Europe are long and there are no alternative forms of transport or routes," she warned.

"Industry is therefore more vulnerable to disruption than in central Europe, where alternative means of transport do exist," added Hedkvist Petersen.

Transport Commissioner Loyola de Palacio said the EU was not turning its back on the region.

She said a new proposal to build-up "motorways of the sea" would help to improve trade links in and to the area.