(Return tabled) Question No. 9 Mr. Peter Stoffer: With regard to the Veterans Review and Appeal Board (VRAB), legislated by the Veterans Review and Appeal Board Act: (a) who are all permanent and temporary members of the Board, broken down by province and territory, appointed by the Governor in Council since 2006; (b) has the government considered disbanding the VRAB; (c) has the government considered modifying the VRAB; (d) has the government considered implementing a policy to ensure that VRAB appointees by the Governor in Council must ...[+++] have (i) military or RCMP experience, (ii) medical experience; (e) what were the total annual federal funds provided to the VRAB from 2006 to 2011 inclusively; (f) what is a breakdown of the annual spending of the VRAB, from 2006 to 2011 inclusively, as it relates to (i) program costs, (ii) administration costs, (iii) salary costs of the VRAB board members, (iv) travel costs for the VRAB board members, (v) VRAB staff costs, (vi) VRAB staff travel costs; (g) how many reports has the VRAB chairperson made to the Minister with respect to the use of resources allocated to the Board from 2006 to 2011 inclusively; (h) when was the last time the Department of Veterans Affairs completed an assurance audit of the VRAB and when is the department planning to conduct the next audit; (i) how often does the department conduct assurance audits of the VRAB; (j) has the department planned an extensive review of the administration of the VRAB; (k) does the Department of Veterans Affairs regularly analyze the reasons why pension decisions are overturned by the VRAB in favour of the client with regard to the interpretation of (i) legislation, (ii) medical issues, (iii) legal issues; (l) has the VRAB provided information to the department on how many pension decisions, made since the VRAB's inception, have been in favour of the veteran client using the benefit of the doubt clause (section 70); and (m) how many pension matters or cases has th ...

4. When a military operation is launched by the Union, the administrator shall, for the amounts of contributions decided by the Council, implement the arrangements with the third States contributing to that operation.

Welcomes the establishment within the Council secretariat of the CPCC, which will serve as the civilian equivalent of an EU Operational Headquarters and will provide assistance and support in the planning and implementation of civilian ESPD missions, thus ensuring a civilian chain of command; calls for such a balance to be reflected in the role and administrative structure of the Civil-Military Cell;

It notes that the military regime has yet to demonstrate convincingly its intention to return to civilian democratic rule within a credible and rapid time-frame and (a) reaffirms the following measures adopted in 1993: - suspension of military cooperation, - visa restrictions for members of the military or the security forces, and their families, - suspension of visits of members of the military, - restrictions on the movement of all military personnel of Nigerian diplomatic missions, - cancellation of training courses for all Nigerian military personnel, - suspension of all high-level visits that are not indispensable to and from Nigeri ...[+++]a; (b) introduces the following, additional measures: (i) visa restrictions on members of the Provisional Ruling Council and the Federal Executive Committee and their families; (ii) an embargo on arms, munitions and military equipment [2] .

Whereas the immediate introduction of the approval arrangements and concomitant abolition of certificates of purchase at the minimum price would lead to excessive changes in administrative procedures; whereas the existing procedures should be maintained provisionally until a new system is devised which in this respect fully complies with the guidelines laid down by the Council; whereas, in addition, the Commission forwarded to th ...[+++]e Council a proposal for a Council Regulation establishing a support system for producers of certain arable crops (4), which entails substantial changes in the present system as from the 1992/93 marketing year, and this will affect peas, field beans and sweet lupins;

This process will be important for discussing provisional military contributions from the non-EU European Allies during the pre-operational phase, and relevant military factors during the development of strategic military options, in order to inform the planning and preparation on which a Council decision to launch an EU-led operation will be based.