Last Joint Committee meeting under Iceland’s Chairmanship in 2022

Published 09-12-2022
From left to right: Sesselja Sigurðardóttir - Deputy Head of Mission of Iceland to the EU; Katrín Auður Sverrisdóttir - Coordinator for EEA Cooperation, Prime Minister's Office, Ministry for Foreign Affairs; Kristján Andri Stefánsson - Ambassador of Iceland to the EU

“As the year comes to an end, we wish to take this opportunity to commend the Secretariat-General of the Commission for your efficient and constructive approach to running the EEA Agreement on the EU side,” said Kristján Andri Stefánsson, Ambassador of Iceland to the European Union at today’s Joint Committee meeting, the last under Iceland’s Chairmanship. The good cooperation was equally praised by Nicolas von Lingen who represented the European Commission.

During the meeting, 66 Joint Committee Decisions were adopted, incorporating 111 EU legal acts into the EEA Agreement. “I believe this is the second longest Long list of the year,” commented the Icelandic Ambassador, highlighting the substantial reduction of the total number of acts outstanding.

Among the acts included was Regulation 2018/1724, establishing a Single Digital Gateway (SDG). The SDG is a platform facilitating online access to information, administrative procedures and support services needed by EU citizens and businesses to exercise their rights in the internal market.

Moreover, there were ten acts in the field of financial services, including urgent acts amending regulatory technical standards and the Audiovisual Media Services Directive from 2018 which governs EU-wide coordination of national legislation on all audiovisual media.

The EEA Joint Committee is responsible for the management of the EEA Agreement and is a forum in which views are exchanged and decisions are taken by consensus to incorporate EU legislation into the EEA Agreement. The committee is comprised of the ambassadors of the EEA EFTA States and representatives of the Secretariat-General of the European Commission.

Find photos from the meeting here.

 

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