22/01/2013 Session
Strasbourg, 22.01.2013 – Hans Peter Lankes, Vice-President of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), today underlined the importance of the Bank’s relationship with the Council of Europe, and in particular with the PACE Monitoring Committee, as a forum for political scrutiny.
Lankes said that Council of Europe texts, along with those of the OSCE and the UN, will become reference points and sources of the highest category that have to be cited, as part of the EBRD’s new political methodology.
The updated political methodology will include an expanded list of 14 criteria to take account of developments and the evolution in understanding of a modern democracy. With these revised procedures in place, the EBRD hopes to be able to assess and measure progress in democracy in a more comprehensive manner, he said.
The EBRD made an estimated 1 billion euros profit in 2012, which will be used to maintain its lending programme and to secure the bank’s AAA rating, Mr Lankes said. The bank had supported 393 individual projects during the year – its largest number ever.