Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-07-02-Speech-2-071"
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"en.20020702.4.2-071"2
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"Mr President, I would like to think the Spanish Presidency for helping the Irish Government, and indeed the ratification of the Treaty of Nice, by allaying fears at least in the defence and security areas. This will hopefully allow us a debate on the real issues surrounding the Treaty of Nice and, as colleagues have said, win the hearts and minds of the Irish people through the two declarations which were annexed to the Seville conclusions, stating that EU common foreign and security policy will not prejudice Ireland's traditional stance of military neutrality.
Great confusion arose during the last Nice referendum campaign with unrefuted scare stories that we could be forced to take part in foreign missions against our will and even that conscription could be introduced. We now have a so-called 'triple-lock', requiring that any Irish military involvement in international missions overseas has to have in every case a UN mandate, as well as the approval of both the Irish Government and the Oireachtas or Irish Parliament.
I do not support the view of many on the 'no' side that NATO is the bogeyman of the world, nor that the UN is necessarily the panacea for all global ills. If we are to have a truly independent or neutral country, as these same people claim to wish, then how do we approve of and allow a situation where any one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council can prevent Ireland from participating in EU missions when we believe they are appropriate? What I am saying is that Irish foreign policy decisions should not require the agreement of Moscow or Beijing. Nor indeed should our Irish troops now be pulled out of Bosnia-Herzegovina because the United States, as we speak, is threatening a veto on the renewal of the UN mission there.
To Commissioner Prodi I say: could I ask you to clarify on the record what exactly you said in Copenhagen yesterday about the implications for enlargement of a second failure by the Irish to ratify Nice? There are contradictory reports and further confusion in the Irish press today. We now need above all crystal-clear leadership on the issue of enlargement, as what is being played out on the Irish stage is a full reflection of the concerns – real and perceived – of all our citizens on the ground.
In conclusion, the countries of Central and Eastern Europe have suffered greatly, first under the fascist and then the communist joke. The time is long overdue for them to be allowed to rejoin the European family. It is above all a moral imperative. Remember what the King of Jordan said here at the last session: 'there is no future for any without a future for all'."@en1
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