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My name is Jim Cloos. One of my primary tasks is drafting the European Council conclusions, so at the level of the heads of state and government, and that is why I am also sitting in the room when the meetings go on so that I can quickly react when leaders want changes in the text. It happens quite frequently that they change or they add things and we have to be very quick in sort of capturing what they want to express in those conclusions which is then translated into all the official languages of the European Union. 'BRUSSELS, DECEMBER 2013 - EUROPEAN COUNCIL' It's a very complex business of course because we are talking about 28 heads of state and government. So it's not an anodyne meeting, it's an important meeting, it's a meeting where decisions are taken. So there is a very elaborate way of preparing this, under the authority of Mr Van Rompuy of course. The European Council is a club, you feel it in the room. There is a sense of responsibility. The leaders - the heads of state and government - want agreements, they want things to move forward. They don't want to come out and say we disagreed on everything. So it is difficult work, there is a lot of tension, there is a lot of fighting, that is democracy after all. I mean democracy is about ideas, very often controversial ideas, then you sit around the table and you try to find a solution. And that's what it's all about. FROM CRISIS, OPPORTUNITY Europe's Story It has been a massive crisis, and probably the biggest one, but not the first one and I would even say it's not the last one, because that's the way things go. Very often the Union actually emerges stronger from crises. This has been a pattern in history. Now this has been a very serious crisis, and it has been extremely painful, but if you step back and look at what has been done, I think it's a major step forward. And I'm utterly convinced that the Union will emerge stronger. Today we are still in crisis, an economic one, a social one, etc. But we're no longer in a situation where it's like we were standing before the abyss, as if Europe could explode from one day to the next. And I think that these political motives, this profound determination to continue this adventure together, has its roots in the long history of our continent with its wars and attempts at peace. So, it's part of history that starts, perhaps, with Napoleon or Bismarck, but also, of course, with 1914 and 1939-45. 'YPRES MENIN GATE MEMORIAL' To soldiers killed in World War I In the battlefields around Ypres, 600,000 young men were killed. 600,000. So this was 100 years ago, and we thought after the First World War that we could organise a lasting peace. Unfortunately, we only started the process of reconciliation in Europe after a Second World War with even more victims. So that's the very beginning of the European Union, that is really the European construction: built on the graves of millions of people. And it was right there, on the ruins and the debris of that Europe, that a certain number of countries got together to say: 'Right, never again. We no longer want to kill ourselves, between the Germans and French, and all the others, and we want to start something new'. So, the moment of European foundation is really based on that idea of peace, which was very strong at the time for statesmen, the elites, but also for the people. It's still felt today, at least by the leaders, that the Europe we have now and that we want to build, that its reason for being, at its deepest level, is still peace; good relations between countries. 'BERLIN, 1989 - FALL OF THE WALL' The Fall of the Berlin Wall was one of the most beautiful moments of European history in the 20th Century. It was a time when Europe became conscious once again, in a way, of its unity. The 10 new member states came to us, to the European Union, as a result of the end of the Cold War. So they lived during decades still in the atmosphere, in the climate of the post-war period. We are now negotiating also with Serbia, with Montenegro, most likely with other countries. So the European Union is still a dynamic process, a process that is going step by step covering the whole territory of the European continent. It is still an attractive project, and people tend to forget this. Enlargement has been, I think, a massive achievement. Let me say this personally, when I arrived in Brussels in 1985 we were 10 member states; we are now 28. That's a revolution. And actually if you ask the countries outside of the European Union, a lot of them want to get in. Look at the debate in Ukraine for instance. It allows you to develop law, a legal system, a system of an internal market which functions, and all of that. If you think that now we have countries which 20 years ago belonged to the Soviet Union, and they are now members. One of them, Lithuania, has just had the Presidency for 6 months. I think it's a miracle. This revolution which we saw, which turned even bloody, made very clear that Ukraine is different than Belorussia or Russia, that Ukrainian people are more pro-European. But still the country is not unanimous on this. I think that we cannot exclude Russia from any developments in Europe, and that Russia is a neighbour, and anyway Russia is an economic partner, anyway Russia is a main energy supplier, and Russia is a huge country, partly in Europe. Still the time is very turbulent. But the people understood that they will not allow politicians to mismanage the country, they want to be directly involved in the decisions of their country's future. And this is also an example for us Europeans; if governments with corruption, with mismanagements are overshooting their legal responsibilities, people in such countries can take their own decisions, and try to influence the future themselves. We need to give no illusions, neither for the new government, neither for Ukrainian people that the road will be difficult. We can only help, but everything that they started to do, they need to finish themselves. When we saw the waving of the European flag, it was a very strong signal that European values are still attractive, because what were they defending? The values of democracy, the rule of law and human rights against a regime that uses manipulation, lies, blackmail and at the end even violence. Real change cannot be imposed quickly. A dictator can impose something, but it is not going to last. This is the beauty of the European Union. Every member state, whatever the present circumstances - there might be some economic or political or other difficulties - takes over the Presidency for six months. Of course it doesn't rule the Union for six months; it chairs one of the institutions of the European Union, a very important institution: which is the Council. It renders a service for six months. So now for 6 months I am almost a Greek civil servant in a way because I work directly for and with the Greek ministers and the Greek senior civil servants. So a presidency is not somewhere in the void, and has to get up in the morning and say: 'What I am going to do with Europe tomorrow?' It is part of a system. I think we should not be stupidly, naively optimistic, but I still believe that Europe is a continent which has a lot to offer. The Union does a lot of things. Free movement, circulation. You don't have to stop at the borders. Our students can travel, can live in other countries. All of this is now taken for granted. And I think we should encourage young people to grab their chances and to do it. The Union will be what the people of Europe will make out of it. And there are ways of influencing, there is a way of making your views known nowadays. So you should do that rather than constantly lamenting and saying that things are going badly. I think Europe has a huge potential. - Produced by the Council of the European Union -