Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/1999-07-21-Speech-3-023"
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"en.19990721.3.3-023"2
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"(DE) Mr President, Mr Foreign Minister, ladies and gentlemen, I concur fully with your speech, Mr Foreign Minister, but unfortunately the German Presidency cannot be assessed in a purely positive light. That is why my words will be less genial in tone than those of the President-elect of the Commission.
The Western European Union must be integrated into the European Union, which would be a welcome move. Should the Assembly of the Western European Union ultimately disappear, then, of course, in addition to the national parliaments, there must be parliamentary accountability at the European level. For this reason, authority in foreign, security and defence policy must accrue even more to the European Parliament, so that there is no sphere within the European Union escaping the influence of parliament and democracy.
(Applause)
I should now like to turn to less pleasant matters associated with the German Council Presidency. Firstly there is the appointment of the new Commission. At the beginning of the year, the Council Presidency advised us to issue the discharge for the 1996 and 1997 budgets, thereby giving us advice that was actually long out of date. The Federal Government was still at a stage of development which we were unable to fully comprehend. Then it came to the nomination and appointment of the two German Members of the Commission. Mr Foreign Minister, it is scandalous how this process has developed. It is scandalous how the Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany has handled this issue.
The Treaty provides for the Members of the Commission to be nominated on the basis of agreement between the President-elect and the national governments. We now know that an individual nominated by the Federal Government did not even have the opportunity to meet up with the Chancellor before the Chancellor"s discussion with Mr Prodi, which means that the Chancellor had no conversation whatsoever beforehand with the individual that he proposed. He then, as it were, imposed these two people on the President of the Commission, the President-elect of the Commission, which did Romano Prodi, the European institutions and the Federal Republic no service.
The list of mistakes of this kind goes on. Even before the German Council Presidency the Environment Minister travelled to London and Paris with the intention of breaking off Treaties. It was to be the first time since the War that Germany would breach international law in the French National Assembly. This was inappropriate behaviour of the worst kind on the part of the Environment Minister. The failure of the German President-in-Office of the Council and the Finance Minister to attend the launch of the euro is another case in point. The disappearance from office of the President-in-Office of the Finance Council is an event that has never before taken place in the history of the European Union.
The Chancellor"s order to drop the Directive on end-of-life cars from the Council of Ministers sitting is something unknown and unheard of hitherto in the European Union, and the order given by the Chancellor that the German Minister of Trade and Commerce should not attend the Council of Ministers sitting in Finland is also without precedent in the recent history of the European Union.
Mr Foreign Minister, I am sure that none of this was intentional, but from Konrad Adenauer, through Willy Brandt and Helmut Schmidt to Helmut Kohl the strength of German politics always resided in the fact that Germany"s partners trusted her. I hope, Mr Foreign Minister, that you will be able to safeguard this trust in the constancy and reliability of German European policy in the future, for it is of importance to progress within the European Union and to the future of our European continent.
(Applause)
The German Presidency was one of peaks and troughs, and whilst we have recognised its successes, there were also serious shortcomings, failures and blunders. The German Presidency had to contend with the tragic situation in Kosovo, and the Berlin Declaration left nothing to be desired in terms of clarity. The German Council Presidency, together with the countries of the European Union of the Western Alliance took resolute action in order to oppose the Yugoslavian tyrant and dictator Milosevic. Such action was necessary and just. Our message on the threshold of the year 2000 must be: never again are people in Europe to be driven from their homes, from their homeland. Human rights, human dignity, the right to a homeland are the foundation of our European civilisation.
On behalf of our group, I should like, Mr Foreign Minister, to address a word of thanks and recognition to you on an expressly personal note, for having championed human rights with such dedication and commitment, even to the point of sustaining physical injury.
(Applause)
But we in our group have often asked ourselves: what would have happened if our political friends had had your political responsibility? Had you been a member of the Opposition, would you have shown the same solidarity towards the Federal Government? That is why we want to say a word of thanks to our political friends in the CDU and CSU, and also to the Liberals, for showing such pronounced solidarity in their support of the Council Presidency.
It filled us with horror, and we are as critical of this as you are, that the chairman of the post-communist PDS shook hands with Milosevic in Belgrade. What is more, this individual"s supporters are represented here in the European Parliament.
Kosovo must now be reconstructed; that is one of the European Union"s main tasks. We must not repeat the mistakes made in Bosnia, when there was so much red tape and everything took so long, but rather the European Union must take rapid action that is free of red tape. In this respect, the Council of Ministers, Commission and European Parliament are called upon to take concerted action that will give the sorely afflicted people in Kosovo, in former Yugoslavia and the Balkans, hope for the future.
Agenda 2000 was decided on in Berlin and it must now constitute the basis on which the first applicant countries will be able to join the European Union during this legislative period of the European Parliament, hence by 2004. The crux of the matter here is to anchor the European family in the principled society bequeathed by European civilisation, the expression of which is the European Union. This will promote stability and safety, democracy and peace. But we also say, and I know that we agree on this, that there are prerequisites to enlargement, namely the reform of the European Union. We welcome your endeavours towards a European Charter and we welcome your endeavours as regards a conference on the reform of the European Union. At the heart of this reform process must lie the long overdue acceptance of the majority system in the Council of Ministers as the fundamental decision-making instrument for this Parliament. For we want this to be a Union which has the power to act and which is rooted in the principles of democracy and the parliamentary system.
The Cologne Summit reached a decision on the Secretary-General, also known as the High Representative. We consider Javier Solana to be an excellent choice. But it is now a case of ensuring that this High Representative is given the authority he needs and that he works constructively with the appropriate Member of the Commission. Furthermore, we must prevent those areas of foreign policy where a common line is already being pursued, from degenerating into mere co-operation between the States of the European Union. We must take great care to ensure that the correct steps are taken in this respect."@en1
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