VICE-PRESIDENT of the European Commission (EC), Neil Kinnock, presented in Brussels guidelines for the recruitment of staff from the 10 candidate countries, including Slovakia, due to join the European Union in May 2004.
"It is essential that the EC embraces the languages and cultures of all member states and it's important to ensure that the civil service has a broad geographical balance of personnel in its ranks at all levels," Kinnock said.
He added that the aim is to have at least one national from each member state occupying a director general, head of department, or similar post.
The former leader of the UK's Labour Party said he did not think that enlargement would not result in a "brain drain" from national administrations. However, the pace of recruitment is accelerating, he said, with the new European Personnel Selection Office currently sifting through over 20,000 applications for 1,000 contract staff positions.
24. Feb 2003 at 0:00 | From press reports of TASR and SITA
