The buy-in and fining requirements should be sufficiently flexible to permit the central counterparty that is responsible for ensuring such procedures are in place to be able to rely on another market participant to perform operationally the buy-in or impose the fine.

It is also appropriate to include requirements on central counterparties relating to buy-in procedures and fines for failed settlement of transactions in shares.

The Commission is actively following the issue of freedom of expression in South Africa and has some concerns over recent events such as the investigation concerning the Sunday Times editor Mr Makhanya, the case of blacklisting of certain journalists and political analysts by the South African Broadcasting Corporation, the proposed Film and Publications amendment and, more recently, the attempted take-over bid of media company Johncom by Koni Media Holdings.

This amendment includes two kinds of modification: firstly, it corrects the slight error made in the figures for Portugal, caused by the duplicate figures supplied by the Portuguese Government on the quota buy-back programme, a mistake which was recognised by the Commission and it was hoped would be corrected automatically during the process of adopting the act; secondly the reductions which, over and above the 0.5% resulting from the disappearance of the national reserve, are applied by the Commission to varieties I and II are not applied.

However, since we have already taken account of the food-aid option and since the Berlin ceiling is set in stone anyway, there is no need to include these points in the recitals of the draft regulation.

However, since we have already taken account of the food-aid option and since the Berlin ceiling is set in stone anyway, there is no need to include these points in the recitals of the draft regulation.