The European Commission has today unveiled a new push to reinforce EU citizens’ rights with a series of actions to tackle obstacles that citizens still face in their everyday life. The 2013 EU Citizenship Report sets out 12 concrete ways to help Europeans make better use of their EU rights, from looking for a job in another EU country to ensuring stronger participation in the democratic life of the Union.
Citizens are and must be at the heart of European integration. To underscore this, the EU institutions made 2013 the European Year of Citizens to give new impetus to EU citizenship and to the citizens’ dimension of the European project. At a time when the EU is taking major steps towards a deep and genuine Economic and Monetary Union1, of which democratic legitimacy is a cornerstone, with a Political Union on the horizon, it is all the more important to focus on the things the EU is doing to make citizens’ lives easier, to help them understand their rights and involve them in a debate on the Europe they want to live in and build for future generations.
EU citizenship brings citizens new rights and opportuni- ties. Moving and living freely within the EU is the right they associate most closely with EU citizenship. Given modern technology and the fact that it is now easier to travel, freedom of movement allows Europeans to expand their horizons beyond national borders, to leave their country for shorter or longer periods, to come and go between EU countries to work, study and train, to travel for business or for leisure, or to shop across borders. Free movement increases social and cultural interactions within the EU and creates closer bonds between Europeans. In addition, it generates mutual economic ben- efits for businesses and citizens, including those who remain at home, as the EU steadily removes internal obstacles.
In 1993, the Maastricht Treaty defined EU citizenship and granted a set of rights to all EU citizens, whether econo- mically active or not. The Lisbon Treaty and the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights reinforced EU citizens’ rights2.
In particular, EU citizens have the right:
• not to be discriminated against on the grounds of nationality
• to move and reside freely within the eu • to vote and stand as candidates in municipal and european parliament elections wherever they live in
the eu, under the same conditions as nationals • to be assisted by another eu country’s embassy or consulate outside the eu under the same condi- tions as a citizen of that country, if their own country
is not represented • to petition the european parliament, apply to the
european ombudsman and address the eu institu-
tions (in any official eu language) and • toorganiseorsupport,togetherwithothereucitizens,
a citizens’ initiative to call for new eu legislation.
Link :
http://ec.europa.eu/justice/citizen/files/2013eucitizenshipreport_en.pdf
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Link : http://ec.europa.eu/justice/events/assises-justice-2013/discussion_papers_en.htm :
The Assises de la Justice - a forum on EU justice policies - seeks to generate ideas which will contribute directly to shaping the European Union's justice policy over the coming years. The Commission is looking for contributions from anyone with an interest in the issues which will be discussed during the conference, and more broadly on the future justice policy of the European Union...
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