Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-09-07-Speech-3-028"
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"en.20050907.2.3-028"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, it was only natural that we should begin today’s debate by invoking the need for balance – a balance between security and the right to freedom, but pain, rage and a sense of powerlessness too, cause us all too quickly to lose a sense of balance in what we say. I was very pleased to hear Mr Schulz’s criticisms of the Council Presidency and its preparedness for real European cooperation, but then he, too, was so carried away by zeal as to make the sweeping statement that we must not be squeamish and must respond to terrorists in the language they understand.
In what language, though, does terrorism speak? It speaks the language of hatred, contempt for human dignity and freedom, and violence, directed without either discrimination or scruple, numbering even the innocent among its victims. Such is the language of terrorism, and we will not respond to it in kind, but with language of our own. The only way we can defend our values is to live by them; by adhering precisely to the law, by using force only with the greatest of reservations, by providing the utmost protection for the innocent. That is our language, and, if we lose our balance under public pressure when we speak, we lose it even more when we act.
You, too, Mr President-in-Office and Home Secretary, spoke about balance, but you had nothing to say about the absence of a Charter of Fundamental Rights, on which closer cooperation in Europe depends, or about guaranteeing the right to freedom. You utterly disregarded the Constitution and the fact that its rejection in France and the Netherlands was demonstrably not a rejection of the European constitution-making process, but an expression of disappointment at unfulfilled expectations. Intergovernmentalism, too, along with the failure of European integration to make progress, had a considerable hand in it.
It is not the rules of war that we should be discussing but the determination to defend rights, freedom and democracy. You said nothing about the way in which parliaments are being circumvented. You had nothing to say about the precarious nature of democracy, about prevention and cooperation between secret services and police forces, any more than you had anything to say about this House’s criticisms of shoddy reports that fail to clarify whether the means used are proportionate, appropriate or necessary. I do not believe that it is enough, if you want to get your hands on new policing resources, to throw around words like ‘terrorism’, ‘people-trafficking’, or ‘international crime’. This Europe of ours will defend itself primarily by simply being Europe – a free democracy founded not upon hate, but upon law."@en1
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