Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-12-13-Speech-2-288"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20051213.57.2-288"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spoken text |
"Mr President, allow me to use the debate to reveal certain unhealthy trends in EU policy towards the Middle East. We all know that Tunisia has a secure constitution. Women have rights to possess, inherit, vote and divorce. Islam belongs to everyone and cannot be used as a political monopoly for one political party. We all know that on the occasion of the World Summit on the Information Society, journalists, defenders of human rights and lawyers were intimidated and heavily beaten by security forces. We all know about President Ben Ali’s long and complicated struggle with An-Nahda – an extremist, radical, pro-terrorist movement which combines its influence with the far left and quite clearly threatens the regime and democracy in Tunisia.
Nevertheless, we should use this opportunity to send a clear message not only to President Ali, but to many other rulers in the Middle East. We must firmly support every possible means to struggle and fight against Islamic radicalism, extremism and abuse of power to explain and present the general truth to everyone. But we must not allow friendly countries, friendly presidents and friendly regimes to misuse our support to wipe out, kill and destroy a diverse, democratic and secular opposition.
The drive for democracy must be based on local ownership and respect for local sensitivities. No respect should be paid to undemocratic practices in which human rights are abused, particularly the right of freedom of expression and criticism, the freedom to gather and to obtain information. We cannot deal with the threat of terrorism, with abuse of the right to explain the truth to everyone and with frustration until we say very clearly that every man and woman should be free to express himself or herself clearly, openly and democratically, be they Tunisian, European journalists or Tunisian human rights activists or lawyers.
State monopolies on newspapers, state monopolies on financing all newspapers, radio and TV channels clearly contradict what we call the ‘information society’. This should be our friendly message to our friend President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali."@en1
|
| lpv:spokenAs | |
| lpv:unclassifiedMetadata |
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples