Mister President
Your Excellencies Ministers, Ambassadors, Deans and Professors
Ladies and Gentlemen

On behalf of the Director General for Social Cohesion of the Council of Europe, Mrs. Battaini-Dragoni, it is a great pleasure for me to take part in the celebration of the 75th Anniversary of the Andrija Stampar School and forward her best wishes for success and her regrets for not being able to attend.

The ancient Greeks used to say: if you want to leave a legacy that would last for generations – create a school. 75 years is a honourable age for a person, and it is moreover so for a school. It means generations of students who graduated and then went on to work for the benefit of society.

For the Council of Europe, the international organisation which endeavours to protect human rights, pluralist democracy and the rule of law, the right to health (as set out in art. 11 of the European Social Charter) is of fundamental importance. It is with this concept in mind that all Council of Europe activities in the field of health are organised: through its many assistance and policy development activities, our organisation advises, assists and supports every year its member states in the promotion of health standards and in the development of health care systems, with particular attention to the right to health of the most vulnerable of their populations.

In the particular context of South East Europe, the Council of Europe sees the protection and the promotion of the right to health and the health care system as an essential aspect of an overall strategy for the development of the region and the protection of its most vulnerable populations.

In order to achieve these goals the Council of Europe is working in this region in partnership with WHO, with whom we jointly organized last year in Dubrovnik a very successful Health Ministers’ forum for South East Europe. A fruitful partnership is also being implemented with the Council of Europe Development Bank, with which the Council of Europe jointly supports the Social Cohesion Initiative of Working Table II of the Stability Pact.

The Council of Europe Development Bank, the only financial institution with an explicit social mandate, is in fact one of the means of action by which the many dimensions of the Council of Europe’s strategy for social cohesion are implemented.

The Bank has been very active in Croatia, who joined the institution in 1997, in particular in the fields of health and education. To date the Bank has approved loans for 8 investment projects for some 114 Million euros to reconstruct and modernise schools and hospitals throughout Croatia; to build social housing for refugees; to create jobs in SME’s, to rehabilitate historical heritage damaged by war in Dubrovnik and finally a project directly related to this school.

The Andrija Stampar School of Public Health is a fine example of a successful health and educational project, which will benefit Croatia and other countries of South –Eastern Europe. The project presented by the Government of the Republic of Croatia to finance the renovation and modernisation of the Andrija Stampar School of public health was approved by the Bank at the beginning of this year. The main social aspects taken into account are:

• Improvement in the quality of public health education;
• Development of facilities for scientific research;
• Establishment of a centre of excellence for coordination of disease control programmes;
• Improved monitoring and management of environmental hazards;
• Increased accessibility to high quality public health services for vulnerable groups of population
• Vocational training provided and
• Job creation.

The Bank has recently signed a loan for almost 3 million euro for the financing of this project.

In addition to their functional and structural links, the Bank and the Council of Europe have set up a Joint Programme to prepare feasibility reports for pilot projects and put in place accompanying measures for already approved loans.

The Directorate General of Social Cohesion, for which Ms. Battaini is responsible, is in charge of the implementation of this programme for the Council of Europe’s side. Croatia has already benefited from the programme: the Health Division of the Council of Europe and the Andrija Stampar School are currently developing measures to accompany the Development Bank’s loan. It will help create 2 new post-graduate master’s programmes for the Andrija Stampar School: one in bioethics and human rights and one in environmental and occupational health. In fact, the first meeting of experts from various Stability Pact countries took place these days at the school.

Conclusion

Thank you for your attention, and let me once again congratulate, also on behalf of Ms. Battaini, this School on its anniversary and for its contribution to social cohesion in Croatia and South East Europe. I wish the Andrija Stampar School of Public Health the very best success in leaving a legacy for generations, for the present and those that are yet to come.