Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-05-09-Speech-1-007"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20050509.3.1-007"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spokenAs | |
| lpv:translated text |
"Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to make a statement commemorating the end of World War II in Europe.
Ladies and gentlemen, we wished to mark this day — the end of World War II, Europe Day and first anniversary of the reunified Europe — in a formal and unusual manner, with music in the Chamber. I would like to present a young Latvian, born in Riga, Miss Baiba Skride.
Miss Skride has accepted our invitation to be here with us today, and to commemorate this event, she has proposed a Baroque piece: Bach’s Chaconne 1004. Alejo Carpentier said that the baroque was undoubtedly the style that most reflects European cultural diversity. In spite of her youth, Baiba Skride has played in the most prestigious concert halls in the world and I am sure that the improvised concert hall we have created from our Chamber will be added to her curriculum vitae today. Miss Skride’s talent and youth are accompanied by a violin made by Stradivarius in 1725 and which is known by the name Wilhelm, in honour of the famous German violinist August Wilhelm, to whom it belonged for almost 50 years.
I propose that you listen and at the same time watch — because sometimes music is also to be seen rather than simply heard — this evidence that our European Union is a synthesis of history, of talent, of youth and hence of the future. Let us do so, if possible, with our mobile phones switched off.
Miss Skride, your violin has the floor.
As you know, and as everybody knows, it is 60 years today since we were able to begin our assessment of the horrors Europe had experienced during that period. The figures are horrific: 60 million dead, the systematic extermination of peoples and minorities, cities and regions reduced to ash and rubble, economies ruined and 30 million displaced people from amongst the civilian populations of all the warring countries. And regardless of the responsibilities of those who started the war, human suffering is human suffering.
In the Pacific, as you know, the war was to continue until 14 August and ended with those horrendous pictures of nuclear extermination. At that point, Europe was a desolated, hungry and threatened continent. With the peace, or at least with the end of the war, on that 8 May, certain political leaders proclaimed that the flag of freedom was flying over the whole of Europe, but today we must acknowledge that, at that point, the end of the war only brought peace and freedom to half of the continent. The other half was the victim of the new world order that was created in Yalta.
In fact, peace and freedom did not reach everybody. On that 8 May, a new European geography was drawn up; totalitarianism was overcome — at least certain forms of it — but another different kind, although equally iron-fisted and more lasting, took half of Europe hostage. Bipolarity was born, a long ideological conflict began and the nuclear era terrorised the world. Our continent was split in two and today, 60 years later, here in the European Parliament, we can at last commemorate a reunited Europe, not an enlarged Europe, but a reunified one. On 1 May we marked the first anniversary of our reunion with the countries that were taken hostage after Yalta. There will soon be more of us and our reunification will be more complete. And this gives greater meaning to this 9 May, Europe Day, on which, 55 years ago, the foundations were established in order to respond to the desolation of war, in order to guarantee that it would never happen again, and this response is now complete with the arrival of the new countries that have joined the Union.
Ladies and gentlemen, I would like today, a day on which we are commemorating three events which differ from each other, but which are related, to be a day of reflection: 55 years since the beginning of the European adventure, 60 years since the end of the war and one year since reunification. This offers us a great opportunity to remember together our duty of memory and, above all, to pass this knowledge on to the younger generations who have never known war and to whom peace appears to be something natural.
That has not been the case, however. The streets of our cities are full of names of people and circumstances, of events that shaped our history and which are part of our collective memory: the Westerplatte in Gdansk-Danzig, the Place Montgomery in Brussels, the Stalingrad metro station in Paris, the Boulevard Dresde, just a few metres from here, and military cemeteries of both sides dotted across Europe. All of this is our common memory, the memory of a continent that today has overcome what then was the subordination of the individual to the State and disregard for law and for human dignity.
Our system today is based on the separation of powers, on popular sovereignty and on respect for human rights. And that is the message we must send to the whole of Europe and the entire world on marking the 60th anniversary of the end of the war and the beginning of the European Union adventure: the commitment to carry on fighting to defend the values of peace, justice and tolerance, not just for Europe, but for the whole world. And we must do so in the knowledge that what the citizens of Europe expect from their Union is no longer peace, because we Europeans already have peace amongst us and we all believe it to be irreversible. Nobody could imagine that we will ever go back to resolving our differences through arms. What the Europeans expect from their Union today is that it contribute to their prosperity and to their security in the face of the new threats in a world which is no longer the same as the one established at Yalta.
I would therefore ask that we look to the future with the firm obligation to achieve that prosperity and security that our citizens are asking us for."@en1
|
| lpv:unclassifiedMetadata |
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples