 Good afternoon and welcome to this webinar hosted by the Institute for International and European Affairs here in Dublin. Today's event is part of the Global Europe project, which is supported by the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs. The Global Europe project aims to analyze and communicate to the wider public the debate on the future of Europe, the EU's role in the world, and Ireland's role in the multilateral order. We are delighted to be joined today by Ana Paula Zacarias, Secretary of State for European Affairs in Portugal, who has been generous enough to take time out of her busy schedule to speak to us today about the conference on the future of Europe. Secretary Zacarias will speak to us for about 20 to 25 minutes, and then we will move into a Q&A session with our audience. You will be able to join the discussion using the Q&A function on Zoom, which you should see on your screens. Please feel free to send your questions in throughout the session as they occur to you, and we will come to them once Secretary Zacarias has concluded her presentation. If I could please request that you identify yourself and keep your questions as brief as possible so that we can get to as many of them as we can during the event. I remind you that today's presentation and the Q&A are both on the record. Please feel free to join the discussion on Twitter using the handle at IIEA. And we are also live streaming this afternoon's discussion. So a very warm welcome to all of you tuning in via YouTube. The speaker today is Ana Paula Zacarias, who has been Secretary of State for European Affairs in Portugal since 2017. She has had a very distinguished career as a diplomat serving as Portugal's Ambassador to Estonia and as Deputy Permanent Representative of Portugal to the European Union. She also served as head of the European Union delegations in Brazil and in Colombia and Ecuador. She holds a degree in cultural anthropology from the University of Lisbon. During Portugal's presidency of the Council of the European Union in the first half of 2021, which concluded just a couple of weeks ago. Ana Paula Zacarias served as one of three co-chairs of the Executive Board of the Conference on the Future of Europe. So she is in a perfect position to give us an update on the progress made in the conference to date and a firsthand impression of how the new procedures put in place for this conference are working out. Giving the floor to Secretary Zacarias, I would like to welcome Ireland's Ambassador to Portugal, Ralph Victory, who is joining us today, and to invite him to say a few words. Ambassador, the floor is yours. Thank you very much, John. Thank you very much, John and colleagues. Delighted to see you all and excuse me, just some technical issues here as I endeavor just to resolve those, pardon me. Once again, John, very good to see you and thank you to colleagues in IIEA for arranging this afternoon's event. And sincere welcome, Cade Milaforte, to Secretary of State Ana Paula Zacarias, who I had the pleasure, in fact, of just having a meeting earlier on today. And John, you've given the background to Secretary of State Zacarias's distinguished diplomatic career. And certainly throughout the Portuguese EU presidency, we were honored to have several exchanges. I know Minister of State for European Affairs on the Irish side, Minister Thomas Byrne, Secretary of State always enjoyed his interactions with you at the various exchanges, both bilaterally and in the context of the General Affairs Council. So we're delighted that you're in a position to join us this afternoon. Thank you very much, indeed, as John says for taking time from your schedule. It's been an extremely busy period for you. I know amongst the various hats that you had to wear during the presidency, it involved a lot of work in the conference on the future of your space in your capacity as co-chair of the Executive Board. So looking forward to an excellent event this afternoon, looking forward to hearing your insights and perspectives. And with that, John, I'll hand back over to you. Thank you again. Well, I think we can thank you very much, Ambassador, for that introduction, which is very welcome. And without further ado, I will hand over to Secretary of State Zacarias. Thank you. Thank you very, very much, Ambassador John Neary. Pleasure to see you again, Ralph. It's a pleasure to meet with you again today. And also a pleasure to be here with all the participants in this video conference. And thank you for giving me this opportunity to interact with the International European Affairs Institute of Ireland to discuss on the conference on the future of Europe. And I must confess that for me, it's very interesting to be here. Two years after I had this first interaction with the institute, when in 2019 I had the opportunity to discuss with you on the new strategic agenda and the future of Europe. And here we are, two years later, with an incredible amount of things that happened. And we were talking at that moment in the age of transition look at the transition we have had in these two years. It was a challenge. And in a couple, in a matter of months, COVID-19 pandemic has brought about profound changes in our societies, not a single person in the EU was being left unscathed by the COVID-19 and by its consequences. It has brought about a lot of suffering, but it was also the opportunity for positive changes. And we hope that these positive changes can be addressed in the interest of generations to come. And this is important because we all know that the Union has been evolving, crisis after crisis, managing to always find ways to evolve. And we had a couple of crises in the last decade. We had the economic and finance crisis. We had the migration crisis. We have Brexit. We have now the pandemic. And we can see that we are facing clearly also a climate change crisis that with terrible consequences as devastating consequences that we are seeing nowadays. And so the question is, are we ready to face this all challenge, all these challenges? And how can we do this? Then we know that along the years, the European Union has been adapting and finding new structures, new ways of being more democratic, more better inclusive and bring in citizens closer since the process where we had the first elections for the European. Parliament in 1979, bits by bits, the citizens have been more and more included in the process of decision making in terms of the processes of the Union. And here we are after a big crisis and in a moment where we really need to bring in people into this decision process. So now citizens have demonstrated that they want a more resilient, a more sustainable, a more inclusive economy to emerge from this crisis. And they want to see us better prepared to deal effectively with the common challenges that are facing all Europeans. And indeed, when we see the polls, we see that a recent Euro barometer survey revealed that 92% of respondents across all member states demand that citizens voice are taking more into account in decisions relating to the future of Europe. So here we are. Are we ready to listen to them? Are we ready to listen to the citizens? And which citizens are we talking about? It's the bubble, the Brussels bubble? Is it the ones that are already interested in European affairs? Can we reach to the people that are living outside our big cities? Can we reach to those that are normally not heard? And it is important that we look into all these elements and we try to figure out at this point what are the changes that we need to do in our Union? What do people really want? What do people want about jobs? What do people want about health? What do people want about changes in terms of climate, in terms of energy, in terms of jobs and in terms of our industry, in terms of the place of Europe in the world? And we need to also put the big question on about our values, about rule of law, about democracy and human rights. How are we dealing with this? So I think that at this point it is indeed fundamental to have this conference on the future of Europe. But what is this conference? How are we going to deal with this? So far we have managed to put it on. On the 9th of May we started the conference on the future of Europe. With very important speeches made by the three institutions, the Council, the Commission and the European Parliament. Very relevant speeches on the future and also with very interesting calls for the citizens to say, to have their saying. And then finally we managed to get a system that makes this conference work, bases on three, on five, I would say, five P's. Let's see, the first P, it's about people. It's about people participating. So we need to find people to participate and have their say. And this has to be a genuinely open, inclusive, transparent, structured, participatory democratic debate, underlying the crucial role of civil society, so that we can bring the voice of citizens to the table, to the European Union table. And people are being heard in terms of, you know, their participation in the platform that has put forward by the Commission, in the participation in the national panels and in the participation of the European panels. So people first, this is the first P, then how can people participate? They can participate through a platform, a digital platform, that is put forward by the Commission, that identifies nine areas where people can put forward their ideas, and they can also upload events, and with all the relevant elements of these events and the reports that are the result of these events. All across Europe. There is no jail blocking in the, in the platform so everybody can participate. Then the third P, which is the panels. We have panels that can be launched at national level. And I know that all of all member states have been engaging in the organization of events of different formats in different formats in different ways. But all member states are engaging in organizing events where citizens can talk about the future of Europe. And then there is the European events. The European panels will gather 800 citizens that are chosen randomly all across Europe, and that are supposed to be like a mirror of the European society as a whole. And this 800 people are supposed to gather in groups of 200 and debate for basic large topics. They are supposed to discuss on economy. They are supposed to discuss on values and democracy. The third block, it's about climate and and all the elements around climate and the fourth block, it's about global Europe. So 800 people divided into groups of 200 debating this for big themes. Today will start this process right now where we we have started already in June with a first meeting here in Lisbon of European citizens with the first group, but now they will start with all the 800 in September. So September and October, there will be the first sessions, presentially, we hope, then there will be a second session online in November, and the third session in December and January, so that these 800 people can come up with concrete proposals on this very big areas of work. And where all this converge the platform, all that is in the platform, all that comes from the national, from the national panels, all the elements that are coming from the debates of the European citizens in these European panels will get to the plenary. And here we go for the for the force team. The plenary will gather all this information, and we'll debate this information, and the concrete proposals that are emerging from all these elements. So today we'll have where there will be probably six plenary sessions. There was one already in June, but we called the inaugural conference plenary. There will be another one in October, one in December, one in January, one in February, and possibly a last one in March to have the conclusions to wrap up so that the final report can be elaborated by the executive board. And that's where it's in this plenary. We have representatives of governments, 54 representatives of government so to for each member state. We have national parliaments for for each member state. So 108 participants from the national parliaments. We collected the same number of participants from the European Parliament so 108 participants from the European Parliament, and also 108 participants from the citizens. The citizens, why 108 they are 80 so 10% of the of the 800 from the European from the European panels. And 27 representatives from the national panels, and then one, which is the, the young men, or the young lady I think it's a lady now that is the president of the European use forum. We have also representatives of the commission of course three commissioners, then committee of regions, 18 local authorities 12 social and economic committee 18 social partners 12 and civil society eight. So all these people will gather to discuss the elements that come from the platform from and from the panels. Here we go to the fifth speed, which is probably the most important, which is policies. So the outcome of the plenary will turn out to be will be discussed in terms of also either very concrete proposals, or in terms of orientation for policies that are then fit in into the system itself. The, the executive board has to prepare a final report for the conference around the months of April, and it will be delivered to the three co presidents to President solid president underlying and the president of the council at the time the rotating presidency will be with it will be handled to President Macron. It's up to them to read the report and then transform it into change into real policies that will make the difference, and will bring us, you know, into a future that has has been also forged and worked with the citizens. This presents you challenges, but I think I will stop here, and then we will have time to discuss about the challenges that these entails, because it's not self evident how are we going to bring all these elements. Use them to change policies, and in the end, if needed, change structures, because if the citizens demand for changing policy that demand may entail a change in the structure and the change in the treaties. So, not an easy right and full of challenges that we need to discuss for me it was really very very interesting and an honor to be part of the executive board of the of the conference on the future of Europe, and I sincerely hope that we will be able to to manage this and to use it as a very good tool because this is a tool to build Europe and to build it the Europe that we want Europe that listen to the citizens and is closer to the citizens. Thank you very much, Ambassador Neary, and I now, you know, engage with the conversation with you because this is all about conversation. Thank you. Thank you very much, Secretary Zacharias for that very interesting and wide ranging presentation. You've given us a very good description of the organization of the conference. Particularly like the method methodology used of the five P's to describe the various elements of the conference and how they link to each other. And it is, I suppose a novel form of organization for a European conference or a European way of considering issues. And so it will take us all I think a little bit of time to get used to this and to get to understand how the various elements work together. So we're already getting questions in via the zoom function but if I could ask you a couple of questions to start the discussion. What relates to the last P you mentioned the policies. Based on your experience of the conference to date. What sort of outcome do you expect the conference will produce. Maybe as in previous intergovernmental conferences, a very defined and clear set of proposals that are ready for implementation, or is it likely to be more as you said, policy orientations that have to be further developed before adoption. And the second question is a number of the topics that are being addressed by the conference are already being dealt with in the European institutions. We have the Commission's green deal. We have the proposed pact on migration and asylum. We're also completing the single market and the banking union and so on. So, in the light of all this work that is already going on, what added value can the conference on the future of Europe bring in these particular areas. Thank you. Thank you very much this this are very relevant questions because this is a democratic exercise. It's an exercise that takes all the relevant elements of of our representative democracy but also goes a little bit further. The European institutions work together to get closer to the citizens. So, I would say that indeed when it comes to climate change and the single market and the, and the job creation and migration. The Commission is doing a lot and the, and the member states with the Commission and with the support of the European Parliament. I wonder how many people knows about this. So, there is an element of awareness about the European Union and its policies that is already a very important element that we have to deal with. So, the idea is to bring all this information also to people so that they can assess it. That's why we also have a set of experts that will support this European panels of citizens in case they need some information of what is being done. And then, when they know what is being done, they can say, okay, this is good, this is enough. We should work on this, or they can say no, we need to do more. And we need to engage more in some sort of policies, because, for instance, in the social domain, we see now after the pandemic that there is clearly an inequality that has been an equality gap that has been generated. And people that lost their jobs might want to have different sorts of policies in there. And then, if this is the case, if people say, yeah, we need something more on fighting unemployment or we need to do something more in the health domain. These are traditional policies that belong to the member states. If the union is going to engage in something more in health, we need to see how far can this be done. So I would say that there are two elements here, the element of listening to people, explaining to people what is being, what is being doing, the union, and listen. And at the same time, trying, it is very important that this doesn't redundant in a populistic exercise, because things are complex and difficult. Things are not black and white. You, when you deal with climate change, you have to deal with energy. And when you deal with this, you have to deal with industry, and you have to deal with jobs, and every single thing is connected to the other. So it's very easy to say, oh, I want this measure. And I want that measure, but we need to make them, you know, make them, to connect them and make them work. So I would say that this outcome is whatever the citizens tell us that it should be. But many of the elements could be policy orientations that citizens would prefer this or that. But eventually, some very specific elements will come out. For instance, I've heard in one of the meetings with citizens, someone saying a very concrete measure. We need to have hospitals that are being assessed with the quality level at European Union level, for instance, we need to have a quality certificate at European level for hospitals. Okay, this is a very specific measure that could be presented. And some would be more kind of orientation or, or a special line, then some people say, for instance, Europe Day should be a holiday, a holiday where we discussed this is the day to celebrate Europe and to discuss Europe. Okay, that's a very concrete proposal to see if it passes or not. And all this will be in the report that the Executive Board have to write and present to the three presidents of the conference. Thank you very much. If I understand you correctly, you are saying that one of the benefits of the conference will be to raise awareness among European citizens. First of all, of the issues that are facing Europe. And secondly, of what is being done to address those issues. And thirdly, perhaps as you said to tease out the limits and the complexities of the various solutions that are being advanced for those problems. So, so raising awareness and perhaps encouraging people to participate more, those could very well be valid and useful outcomes of the conference. Absolutely, I agree 100% because we have tried first with the citizens dialogues to do this. This goes a bit further down because it brings people to the difficulties and to the challenges of decision making. One thing and to do that, people have to understand the complexity of the of the system that we have the complexity of the policies and also the relevance of the European Union and what we are doing because sometimes people are not aware that some when I talk to people sometimes I say, if, if we were to paint blue, everything that in this room is connected with European Union, we would certainly have not just a blue flag out there, we will have a blue room, because we're talking about quality of the air quality of and we are talking about the, the, the elements of our, the efficiency of lamps of, you know, elements that are connected with with the paint that we have on the doors and if it's safe or not for children. So, all these elements are Brussels policies are Brussels decided. So, I think a lot of people do not do not have that perspective and it is important to raise their awareness on this. Yeah. Okay, thank you very much. Yeah, we have a couple of questions on technical aspects of the procedures for the conference. The first is about the, the conference plenary. I think this should adopt its conclusions by consensus. But if there is a vote, if that becomes necessary on the final report of the conference, and will all members of the plenary have voting rights, or will it only be the members of the institutions and the national governments. That is a very, very important question because so far conclusions are to be taken by consensus. And, and this is very relevant because in principle, we are not, there shouldn't be any vote. So, this should be taken by consensus. And if in the end, there are different opinions, those different opinions should be presented as such in the report. They should be identified and say, that is option one, supported by data and option be supported by. And, and so this different possibilities should be should be present in the report. And, and so this is not as much as possible, avoiding to vote. The idea is to to proceed with the debates with the discussions and, and then take all these elements into this into this final report. And this is taking place against the background of the COVID pandemic, which has not gone away and indeed in some countries is showing signs of resurging. Has any thought been given to how to manage the conduct of the conference in the event that further restrictions on meetings or interactions between people become necessary as a result of the pandemic. In terms of the conference itself so we have the first the plenary, which was an hybrid format. There were, I think, 100 and something people present physically in Strasbourg, and the others were online, and it worked very well. Now for the next plenary is we hope that they can be done already physically in the big meeting room of the of the European Parliament in Strasbourg. We are talking about a set of more or less 400 people. And the room is for has been set for 750 so there is there is space enough. But at the same time I think we need to allow to continue to allow for a hybrid format for the panels for the the citizens panels. As I said, so far, what is scheduled is that a first block will be physical, if possible, 200 200 200 and 200 so the 800 people divided into four groups. And then, and then to have the second session will be online, exclusively online, and then the third session of the panels will be again physically where they have to write down a set of proposals and the different in the different areas. So let's hope that this can be this can be done. At the end of this, the, we hope to have also a final event with this 800 citizens to give them feedback about what happened to their proposals because I think this is very important. We cannot just listen to people we need to listen, and then tell them what, what have you done with what what have we done with their proposals. So, at a certain point we have to, to give them feedback and say, well we've listened to you this proposal was presented to the plenary the plenary decided this way or that way, and it will find its way into the final report, or not. So, we will have to get back to people. Thank you very much. We have a question from a friend and former colleague of mine, and Barrington, who recalls what you said to the IEA, the last time you spoke about a Europe in transition, and about inequalities, leading to a questioning of democratic processes. And across Europe and Ireland in particular, unequal access to social and affordable housing is feeding into the perception, and the realities of inequalities. So her question is in what way could the conference on the future of Europe assist in ensuring that access to decent housing is a principle in the Charter of Fundamental Rights. Interpretations of state aid rules should not overrule the rights of member states to determine their own housing regimes as a service of general economic interest. Well, this is a big thing because during the Portuguese presidency, we thought that the social issues were central, not only because of the pandemic, since we know that a lot of people lost their jobs. Enterprises were losing their capital and quitting, and we saw that the most vulnerable ones were the first to lose jobs and women and migrants and people with disabilities, and then we had the situation of our elderly people that were the most affected by the crisis itself, particularly those that were leaving in the context of homes or care homes. So we brought in the social aspect in our presidency to the heart of the presidency to discuss this matter. And we did this because of the pandemic but also looking towards the future, because if we are going to have a, as we say, a more sustainable and more innovative or a digital future. These are immense opportunities, but they will also entail some challenges. People will probably lose their job because the factory that was called operated will close and what will happen to my job, what will happen to my family. And what will happen in the factory where my job has been taken, you know, by automation. So this, we need to give trust and confidence to the people that we're taking care of them. Not only promoting the creation of new jobs and better jobs, but also doing the skilling and reskilling of people so that they can, you know, face with more confidence this challenges and fight against poverty, particularly children's poverty. And at the same time, the element of housing is is another one that come comes into here during our presidency we were not able to discuss the issue of housing. A lot of member states said no, this is national policy, and it's not it's not easy. So, and this is one of the elements that has to probably will be asked to be addressed by many citizens, particularly also young people that do not have access to affordable housing. So, if this comes in, we need to address it and social policies in the event that we organize the in Portugal on the 17th of June with European citizens, this was one of the elements the social came back and forward. And the housing also was brought in by a young lady who said I am living at my parents I cannot afford a house anymore. We cannot I cannot. So, this is, and then that is also the issue of integration of migrants. And how do we support this integration, and how do we bring also this into work and this in housing for these people. So, I'm sure that these elements will be brought by the citizens to the debate. And then the thing is, if the report already presents some ideas for solution, or not, because this is another issue. The report can say, Okay, we have identified a problem with housing in Europe. How do we treat this, how should we treat this. So if there are already some ideas for solutions, then it's easier. If not, then it will be just bringing in demands and problems. Yeah. So this report, the final report will be a fundamental document. So, do you think that the conference could lead to greater demands for social issues like housing, and perhaps the resettlement of migrants being dealt with at the national level or the local level, rather than having a scheme prescribed at European level for everybody. Maybe in that direction, but it also could be in the sense that European money should used for that. And the sense that we now have the recovery plans, and we have the European budget. So, affordable housing should be one element that is not concretely mentioned. I do not want to preclude what the citizens will ask. And, and I'm sure that some of them will say, leave these to the local level I don't want the union to interfere. Others will say, we need a European solution for this. We need to have a possibility of having young people traveling around and and having not just give them the opportunity of traveling but give them the opportunity of leaving in in another country and having the right affordable housing. We need to see what do the citizens bring bring us on on on these on these elements. And it's very interesting because when you open this box, you don't know what will come out of it. It was very interesting to have, we had a citizen from Cyprus, talking about the need of a urine, a union that is that that is built on values but more on that more than that. He was talking about a certain spirit spirituality that is needed. And some people will say, Oh, this is not what we need to talk about. But for others, this is important also. It's not just. It's the values. It's very important but he was mentioning this kind of in a philosophical way that we need to go back to the principles to the basic principles. And I think this is this is interesting. We never know what people will bring about. It's very interesting. And it brings me to another question which is about the role for faith based organizations in the conference. There is as you know under article 17 of the Treaty on the functioning of the European Union, provision for an ongoing consultation between the Commission and religions and philosophical organizations. And I wonder if, based on your experience so far, you think that those organizations could make a useful input to the conference on the future of Europe. So, thank you, Ambassador Mary for that question to because there was a big discussion about it. When we were discussing the rules of procedure and, and how could we better integrate this dimension. And at a certain moment we said that okay, let's decide that one of the eight representatives of the civil society will be a representative people with disabilities. And at least the other one should be a representative of the religions and philosophy of philosophical organizations. And, and then a big discussion came about because the idea is it's very difficult to have one one representative. And, and we, we were counting the different organizations, even when they built some sort of associations of federations of organizations, and we had at least I think 25. And, and so the decision was taken that we do not say anything about it's up to the civil society to organize themselves and see who they send as representatives to the plenary, if, even if they want to do kind of a rotation to because they ate so there are thousands so could be a good thing to have a rotation. But it would be important for the members of the executive board to meet with the representatives of the religion and philosophic organizations to have to have their input their direct input. And if they produce a report, we need to take it into consideration I think it could be most appropriate that we listen also to that segment of the population. Okay, thank you very much. And we have a question from from Ross Fitzpatrick who's a researcher at the Institute about the, the outcome of the conference, and to what extent it's likely that that will involve treaty change. Given that there are a number of member states who are very hesitant about treaty change. How likely do you think it is, and that it will be possible to achieve agreement on treaty change. And at this stage that that is also another very complex question, because I think the basic line is, let's talk about policies. Let's talk about policies let's talk about what people want in terms of things that affect their daily life. I, I, I don't think that a lot of people want to engage in the discussion about speech and candidate and and about things like that, though, as important as they might be. So I, I think it's important to listen to what people want. And if what they want means that we need to change the treaty, then we will get to it. But the basic idea is, we do not exclude, it's not a taboo. It's not a taboo, we can talk about it. But in a, in a, in a, I would say in a logic order. When we start listening to people they say, we want more health, we want a European health policy, really centered with this new organization era, and with the organizations that deal with health. It's not just for the pandemics is for cancer research. It's for, you know, other elements of public health. And there, we need to see, do the Lisbon Treaty has the needed flexibility. So far we found it that it's okay. We have already a new program for health, and we didn't change the treaty and things worked quite well. But if people want more, maybe we need to change something. Other people, you know, in, in these conversations, there is a lot coming up, people saying it takes a long time for the European Union to take decisions far too long. We cannot wait for a decision for months and months, sometimes years, when the decision is taken, reality has already overcome the decision that the European Union is taken. So you need to change, you need to change, or you need the idea to change this consensus decision, and have qualified majority, others say, oh no, you need to find ways in which people can work in different partnerships, like we did for Schengen, or like we did for the Euro, not everybody has to be on board. Everybody has to have the same opportunities, and adhere to these partnerships if they want. But, you know, these are ideas people are showing ways. And I think the European Parliament, in many ways, has very clear ideas also when they discuss and they debate this. So, treaty changes, maybe, I don't know, it depends on what comes from the people, I would say. And Alexander Conway, another researcher at the Institute, asks about the cultural issue, which is that citizens of 27 different countries are going to engage with each other in the framework of this conference. So, from very different historical traditions, from countries with different economic situations, and so on. How easy will it be, do you think, based on your experience to bring about a consensus between people from these very different and varied cultural contexts. That's not going to be easy, but that's who we are. That's building a European culture. It's this famous motto that we should never forget, united in diversity. And the more we meet in these ways, the more people understand each other, the more people understand what are the other's cultural background. I think the more we can build a European culture, a European identity. It's easy. No, it's not easy. But I think, I think it's my perspective that the more we do this, the better a union we will build. Because this means that we are able to listen to others, to listen to the other's expectations, and to understand. And to understand, I think it is fundamental at the moment when we see the social networks, where people express such a, you know, hate and then distress, and it's my voice, it's my opinion, not yours, you are not right, I am right. The more we open the possibility for people really to interact in an open, in an open way, listening really to each other. I think that that's the best way that we can have to build the future of Europe. We can do this with 800 citizens. I think this this will be very interesting. It's a unique experience that we are opening up. If this works, we can do more and more of this, because this is another issue. Will the conference die on April 22. Or this will be the first chapter. I don't know. I think nobody really knows. We all know, as members of the executive board that that we, there has to be prepared a report has to be prepared has to be sent to the leaders they have to act. But will the process stop. I, that that's another conclusion that should be a conclusion from the conference itself. It's a very inspiring note on which to to end our discussion. And I'm afraid that time is against us and we have to bring this session to a close. You've been very generous with your time secretary Zacharias, and we're very grateful to you for sharing your insights into the conference and the future of Europe with us. You've given us a lot of very valuable information. And I hope that it will encourage people to engage with the conference, and to ensure that their voice is heard. So once again, Secretary Zacharias, thank you very much for addressing us today and responding to our questions. And thank you to everyone who tuned in and joined in the discussion. A big thank you as well to the staff of the IIA who organized this event. So thank you all, and goodbye. Thank you very much.