Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-04-24-Speech-3-059"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20020424.3.3-059"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spokenAs | |
| lpv:translated text |
"Mr President and the Council, two weeks ago, the joint resolution on the situation in the Middle East tabled by the Group of the Party of European Socialists, the Group of the European Liberal, Democrat and Reform Party, the Group of the Greens/European Free Alliance and the Confederal Group of the European United Left/Nordic Green Left was voted through by a narrow margin here in the European Parliament. We in the Christian Democratic Group of the European People’s Party and European Democrats voted against. The truth is the only way to genuine peace, reconciliation and coexistence.
Those who tabled the resolution chose to criticise the State of Israel on twelve occasions, but the Palestinians and the Palestinian Authority on only three occasions. Neither Hamas nor Islamic Jihad, labelled as terrorist organisations by the United States and the EU, were mentioned or criticised in the European Parliament’s resolution. Nor was there any mention of the groups designated as terrorists by the United States, namely Hezbollah and the Al-Aqsa Brigades.
The last-named group constitutes the military wing of Yasser Arafat’s Fatah movement and is responsible for the suicide bombing in Jerusalem on 12 April in which six Israeli civilians were killed.
Only three speakers made any specific mention at all of these terrorist groups during the two-hour plenary debate in Strasbourg on 10 April. Nonetheless, everyone knows that these men associated with violence and suicide bombings – these people who are happy to see sons or daughters sent to kill other people and who receive money from Iraq for the purpose – are not at all prepared to recognise the State of Israel’s right to exist in the area. I say to the President and to the Spanish Presidency that these terrorist groups are a part of everyday life in the Middle East. How are we to deal with their existence?
The PPE-DE Group chose to vote against last time because we feel that the EU and the European Parliament are becoming less and less relevant to the parties. The debate in this House reveals a type of one-sidedness which means that we are not taken seriously by either party to this deeply tragic and bloody conflict.
The time should be past when the European Parliament adopts politically lightweight resolutions simply in order to achieve what, from an objective point of view, is an impossible consensus across the whole political spectrum, from left-wing socialists and communists by way of social democrats to green liberals and Christian democrats, Eurosceptics and members of the radical right. The time has come for the EU to become relevant to both parties in the Middle East."@en1
|
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples