Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-12-17-Speech-1-086"
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"en.20011217.3.1-086"2
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"Mr President, I welcome the outcome of the Laeken summit. On balance it is a very positive one. The decision to establish a European Convention paralleled by a forum for civil society is a historic one in its proportions. Never again will the future of Europe be decided behind closed doors, provided we do our work constructively in the Convention.
I particularly welcome the possibility of a European constitution as a possible outcome. As has been said by Mr Verhofstadt, there should be no taboos in our debate and the idea of federalism and a constitution for Europe could guarantee the role of the citizens in small states better than any other form of governance.
I endorse wholeheartedly the decision of the European summit to give its support to Yasser Arafat as the leader of the Palestinian people and I condemn without reservation the misuse of the Security Council veto in blocking the appointment of international observers to the Middle East conflict.
These decisions, however, were tarnished by an unseemly squabble among some Member States about the location of European agencies which reflected the worst features of the old way of running Europe. I am also disappointed the Council did not give its explicit support for a legal framework for public services in the context of competition regulations, as the European Parliament urged.
Finally, I also believe it was a serious mistake to back off from a decision to nominate a European Union peace-keeping force for Afghanistan under a UN mandate. This unfortunately now leaves this area to the dictates of the interests of the more powerful states on the world stage and fails to provide a political presence and role for European values.
Could I finally say that we should ease up a little on the ageism in relation to the praesidium. I am more interested in the originality or old age of the ideas of these three individuals rather than their chronological age. I do think, however, that had we tried, we could have found an older woman who could have also made an important contribution to the praesidium."@en1
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