Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/1999-07-21-Speech-3-114"
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"en.19990721.6.3-114"2
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"Mr President, time and again, we will return to those issues that have been raised here in these two hours or so. I apologise sincerely for not being able to respond to all the excellent, well-considered and immensely important speeches that we have heard here today. I have solved the time problem to some extent by addressing some of the issues that have been touched on by the majority of members in my response.
I have tried to be as brief as possible to keep to the schedule, and in keeping with the spirit of the new, efficient European Union.
Firstly, the situation in the Balkans. In September, when I come to the committee meeting here I shall certainly be once more engaged in the same discussion. However, I would like to answer two questions. Firstly, the position on the Commission"s agency in Thessaloniki, which has been expressed here, comes as no surprise. The Commission expressed the same position in the General Affairs Council. The General Affairs Council made a unanimous decision, which you are aware of, and which I mentioned in my speech.
We begin from the position that the European Union will approach the issue of stability in the Balkans on a regional basis. Accordingly, the headquarters will be in Thessaloniki. However, the centre of operations, the first of such, will be in Pristina and there will be more of them in other regions as and when facilities improve. I sincerely hope that we, the Commission and you yourselves will achieve consensus on this matter. As far as I am aware, we have a tradition that when the Heads of our Governments and States come to a decision on an issue at a summit, be it a regular or extraordinary meeting, we strive in the General Affairs Council to find a way of implementing that decision. This is what was done in the case of the Thessaloniki office as well as with regard to the broader plan and Hombach. As the country holding the Presidency, we shall strive to implement, as I said, all those decisions we need in respect of Sarajevo and the future. In every respect I agree that we have to avoid excessive bureaucracy. That is not the right way to provide employment for the citizens of the European Union. But we do need a sufficient number of skilled officials to take care of the operation. As for the other matters, I would just like to say briefly that despite all the help we shall give the region, ultimately the responsibility obviously lies with the people there themselves. We will only be providing them with support.
Serbia is a part of the Balkans. For this reason, we have looked at great length into ways of helping Serbia to achieve democracy as quickly as possible. One condition of the return to democracy is freedom of opinion. In this I agree with what has been said here regarding the safety of those who are speaking for freedom of opinion and also the proposal that we should create, through various means, a structure to support real freedom of opinion for this country.
The war is behind us, but the peace has to be built. For this, we shall also need peacekeeping forces. Finland is not a Member State of NATO, though you might perhaps have formed the opinion she was, from some of the speeches we have heard. But Finland respects the choice of those eleven EU Member States who do belong to NATO. Finland, which has a population of five million, is making its contribution by sending eight hundred peacekeepers to Kosovo. You may compare that figure in terms of the population of your own country. In my opinion, we should all share in the task of ensuring that the Balkan region is secure. But as I said before, for this we need a non-military option in addition to the military one. In this connection, I would like to acknowledge the role played by Denmark for being the first country to allude clearly to this issue in the resolution passed at the Cologne Council meeting. Denmark was the country to make the proposal, but Finland is the country which, as holder of the Presidency, will promote this worthy initiative as vigorously as possible in co-operation with others.
I would also like to mention that the International War Crimes Tribunal is, in our opinion, extremely important, and the tribunal dealing with war crimes in Yugoslavia is a special partner in co-operation for us. We have been co-operating together in Kosovo ever since the report was put together on the mass killings at Racak, when the expert opinion of Finnish coroners was used. We believe this policy is a coherent one.
Next, I will briefly mention the Tampere Summit again. We will strive to strike a balance, a very delicate balance, between human rights and the question of security. The Tampere meeting will be preceded by an independent meeting of non-Governmental organisations, and we, for our part, wish to offer them our support, while obviously respecting their independent status. The European Union must not be allowed to become a fortress: it must be both strong and open at the same time. This is the principle upon which we will operate, with respect to the Tampere Summit also. The rights of minorities are a weak area in established democracies also, whatever aspect of minorities they are concerned with. I wish to call attention to the fact that there is often room for improvement in all our countries when it comes to the status of ethnic minorities. The Roma are a European minority with no host country to speak up for them when their rights are being violated. I have been in touch with the foreign ministry in Slovakia, one of the applicant countries, and we have begun talks on how the issue may be solved from their point of view. But there is no cause for complacency: the status of the Romain Europe is by no means good. In addition, the situation regarding the rights of minorities in Turkey has been mentioned here. I spoke of it in my speech, and the Kurdish question will most certainly be a subject for debate here very often in the future, when we shall strive to find a way to improve the situation.
As for enlargement, we shall accept with seriousness the challenge this presents while Finland holds the Presidency. As I must respect the order of business I cannot go into this question in any great detail now as it would take up too much time. But I would like to assure you of two things. We shall treat the applicant countries as impartially as possible, on the basis of the Commission"s reports, and we shall try to make our decisions wisely so that the applicant countries will feel they have made progress according to their individual merits, believing the process to be fair, efficiently undertaken and conducive to the common good. For this reason, we Finns have never made promises in connection with timetables any more than we have regarding other matters. However, in our opinion, enlargement is a special issue, and we will do everything within our power in the area of institutional reform to move it along. Institutional reforms must be introduced in such a way that the Union can live with them even when the number of Member States has exceeded twenty.
Finally, I have to commend the many here who have spoken of a socially and ecologically strong Europe. That gives me hope. I mentioned it today to a group representing young people in Europe, who met me, as a representative of the European Union, at a writing competition award ceremony. I assured them that we would be giving consideration to the issue of youth, although there is no longer any special portfolio attached to this issue. Issues of youth can be successfully dealt with by means of mainstreaming, just as effectively as, for example, issues of gender equality, aged people, as has been touched upon here, and other such matters. I believe that we have to discuss the matter again with the new Commission, and also with you here in the European Parliament."@en1
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