Zwitserland akkoord met hulppakket voor regionale subsidies aan nieuwe lidstaten (en)

The Swiss cabinet on Wednesday (22 February) hammered out a €640 million aid package to contribute to the EU's cohesion fund for the bloc's "new" member states over the next five years.

Switzerand is not a member of the European Union but has signed a number of bilateral agreements with the 25-strong body, in which it has also committed itself to contribute to the union's solidarity tools.

One of them is the cohesion fund which aims to sponsor projects that help poorer EU countries develop their social and economic infrastructure, mainly in the field of environment and transport.

The green light to Bern's package came after long discussions with Brussels, due to the Swiss condition that its financial injection should be used exclusively for the ten countries from central and eastern Europe, plus Malta and Cyprus, which joined the EU in 2004.

The condition was rebuffed by some less prosperous "old" member states, like Portugal and Spain, still eligible according to the current EU rules to receive money from the cohesion fund.

But the EU eventually agreed on the mechanism to divide the Swiss support among the ten new entrants only, with Poland set to pocket half of the cash, followed by Hungary and the Czech Republic as the two other biggest beneficiaries.

The final deal is to be signed on Monday (27 February) in Brussels, while the allocation of the finances will be conducted by Bern in the coming months.

"This aid will be handed over for programmes and projects chosen by us in agreement with the country receiving it," said Swiss economics minister, Joseph Deiss, according to Swiss news agencies.

The first payments are expected to be made in 2007.