Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-01-17-Speech-3-016"
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"en.20010117.1.3-016"2
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"Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, Mr Solana, there are few occasions on which it can have been so important that the truth of the matter, the whole truth, emerges in a parliamentary debate as this one. The vast majority of countries that comprise the European Union, whether they are members of NATO or not, participated in various military and police operations in the Balkans, through their armed forces and security forces. They did so because they felt that this was the most appropriate way to protect civilian populations and their fundamental rights and to contribute to peace and to the country’s reconstruction and democratic rehabilitation.
The situation is that in some of these countries, including my own country, Portugal, several worrying cases have arisen. In Portugal, these cases are of leukaemia and other pathologies associated with radiation in soldiers who served either in Bosnia or Kosovo, one of which has already proved fatal.
These cases have raised and continue to raise, in medical, scientific, military and political circles and consequently in the mind of the public of these countries, justified concern at the possible relationship – which, I emphasise, has not been proved – between exposure to depleted uranium contained in used missiles and the outbreak of the diseases I have just mentioned. It is therefore crucial to ascertain the truth of this relationship, first of all because important human values that require respect and serenity in the face of the legitimate concerns of the soldiers and their families are under threat.
Secondly, because scientific information is as yet incomplete and we need to establish beyond a doubt whether there is a cause and effect relationship between the use of weapons containing depleted uranium and the health problems that we have been seeing. Also, because it is unacceptable that there should still be controversy over the degree of information that NATO claims to have given the governments and military authorities of the countries participating in missions in good time and the conditions under which their armed forces and the security forces took part in military and police operations.
Lastly, because it would be incomprehensible and even paradoxical for our countries to have participated in missions for peace and to promote human rights in the Balkan region and to possibly left there an unsolved public health and environmental problem that affects precisely the populations that they seeking to protect. This is a matter which, in any event, must be taken seriously and to its conclusion, regardless of the consequences.
Mr Solana, I thank you for your first speech, not least because of the spirit of openness that you demonstrated. You were Secretary-General of NATO at the time of the military operations under question and you are now responsible for the implementation of the European Union’s common foreign and security policy. You are therefore in a position, if you like, to make an enormous contribution to the European Parliament's ability to find, together with the governments of the Member States, NATO and other international organisations, the best solutions to this case at scientific, political or even military levels. That is what we hope for from the Council and from you."@en1
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