Antici group
The Antici Group (English Antici Group ) is a preparatory body of the Committee of the Permanent Representatives of the Member States of the European Union . The Antici group was set up to regulate technical details and questions relating to the organization of work when the Coreper II agendas were reviewed . This preparatory stage aims to provide an initial overview of the positions of the delegations at the Coreper meeting. It was brought into being in 1975 by the Italian ambassador Bombassei, who presided over the semester, and Bombassei appointed his assistant in the permanent mission, Paolo Massimo Antici, to be its chairman.
The group consists of the direct staff of the Permanent Representatives and a representative of the European Commission . An antici is an employee of a ministry (often foreign ministry) in his country. As political advisor in the permanent representation of his country in Brussels, he prepares the advice of the permanent representatives committee. He is the assistant to the permanent representative. A member of the Cabinet of the General Secretariat and an official from the Legal Service also attend the group's meetings .
The group is tasked with informing each other about the positions of their superiors, exploring possible scope for action and determining the order of the items on the agenda. It prepares the decisions on the items under Part I of the agenda (A items) as well as the deliberations of Coreper and the Council in the area of transparency . Furthermore, it should be ensured that the short minutes of the previous Coreper meetings can be approved by the permanent representatives. At the meeting in question, the delegations also indicate which requests for items to be included under "Other" they will be making.
The meetings usually take place in the afternoon before the AstV II meeting, chaired by the Antici presidency . If the permanent representative is unable to attend, he will be represented at Coreper by his antici. The Antici group also takes part in the meetings of the European Council in an adjoining room. During the hearing, the officials are called by the head of government of their delegation into the main hall via a bell system if he needs documents or to take on handouts and tasks. From there they send messages and information about the status of the negotiation, which they received beforehand from the recorder of the meeting, to their delegation offices and sometimes also to journalists.
The counterpart is the Mertens group .