PALMA TO HOST SUMMIT

PALMA
PALMA will, on January 31, host a bilateral summit meeting between Spain and Germany.
Spanish Government sources said that the meeting in the Balearic capital will be one of the three high level meetings which the Spanish Prime Minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero is expected to hold next month, and it will be the only one to take place on Spanish soil
The other two bilateral summits will take place in France and Portugal, probably in Paris and Braga respectively. Nothing is known about the agenda for the talks between Zapatero and the German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

The last meeting between these two countries was in September 2006, when Zapatero and Merkel met in Mersburg (Germany) to discuss the takeover of the Endesa power company by the German multi-national E.ON. Everything points to the fact that the Spanish Government chose Palma because of the attraction it has for German tourists.

In the year 2000, when Zapatero was only the General Secretary of the PSOE (Spanish Socialist party), he came to Majorca for a meeting with the then Chancellor of Germany, Gerhardt Schroeder.

Schroeder had chosen Majorca for his holidays and the meeting with Zapatero was the first international support he (Zapatero) had received.
The meeting in January will mean a great lift in profile, both for the city and the Balearics in general, as it continues to be a leading destination for German tourists.

With regard to the other summit meetings, the first will be the Spanish-French meeting, expected to take place in Paris on January 10, and where the collaboration in the fight against ETA will dominate the talks, as they did during the meeting the two countries held at the end of last week at a summit in Portugal.