(ANSA) - TRIESTE - ''The Central European Initiative is a useful tool that has grown over time, and has been able to adapt to the new reality, and now also has new potentials''. This is what the Secretary General of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Michele Valensise, told ANSA during his visit to the Secretariat of the CEI in Trieste.

''Under the enlightened leadership of Ambassador Caracciolo - Valensise added - the Cei may play a role not only to promote Italian companies in the Balkan region, but also to attract foreign investment in the Region of Friuli Venezia Giulia, the core of Cei's activity''. During this first official visit of a Secretary-General of the Foreign Ministry to the CEI, greeted by Ambassador Giovanni Caracciolo di Vietri, Valensise recalled the starting point of the initiative, resulting from an Italian intuition, even before the fall of the Berlin Wall. ''Today there is a new element - he added -, which is the intensity of our willingness to implement these policies, along with the continuous attention we pay to this region, by answering the quest for solidarity, economic cooperation, political and cultural exchange. Valensise also reported the government's desire to promote a ''relationship between the Cei and the activities of the Adriatic Ionian Initiative, two initiatives - he underlined - which don't compete with each other but complement each other''.

''We respond to a request for 'more Italy' in this area - Valensise concluded - and we believe that the process of rapprochement may have a positive effect on the reforms in all these countries, through a sort of 'revisited' external constraint''. (ANSA).