Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-03-12-Speech-3-280"
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"en.20080312.20.3-280"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, I also wish to begin by paying homage to the French soldier who died on active service during a dangerous peace-keeping mission. We wish to express our condolences to the family of this soldier, the victim of a difficult mission.
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, I felt that it was important to make these points. I would like you to know in any case – and I wish to say this publicly – that I fully undertake to monitor this issue on a daily basis. I am willing to go there when I feel that that would be necessary and useful, and I can do this at very short notice. I have arranged to meet President Beshir quite soon, and President Déby again, particularly on the issue of relations between Sudan and Chad. In addition, I will obviously continue to maintain the necessary contacts with the various political actors and civil society in a bid to make progress on this inclusive dialogue, without which there cannot be any lasting solution in the region.
I was not aware that Mr Yorongar and Mr Saleh’s son were in the galleries. I also wish, therefore, to welcome them and tell them – though this has not been officially requested of me – that I am naturally willing to meet them if they wish to apprise me of any information I may lack. I am very happy to meet with them.
Several of you spoke along the lines of my initial comments, in other words, to the effect that we are increasingly calling for inclusive dialogue to bring together all the parties involved: the government, of course, the government majority, the representatives of the opposition, including – and I have made this quite clear to President Déby – the representative of the armed rebels, but also – and here I would perhaps like to have everyone's support – the representatives of civil society, since they are very much absent from the process, and I do not detect any great desire in any of the other camps to include them. At my meeting with the representatives of the Monitoring Committee led by Mr Lol, I was able to tell them it is equally important that civil society be involved in the process.
Secondly, I believe that there will be no lasting solution without dialogue, but there cannot be any lasting solution in Chad if there is no solution or no restoration of relations between Sudan and Chad. It has been clearly established that there are various influences at play here, and thus it seems to me that this is another parameter of the solution.
Mrs Aubert, I obviously agree with your concerns and the need to exert maximum pressure on President Déby, and in fact on everyone concerned, to ensure that human rights are respected. I have spoken out very clearly and firmly against the arbitrary extrajudicial arrests. A demand has also been made for the state of emergency to be lifted, with no ambiguities. As I said, we also asked for the committee of inquiry to be open to the representatives of the international community in order to guarantee objectivity and tangible results.
I wish, however, to make a small clarification in relation to your request for the EU to have a policy that differs from that of France, since otherwise this would not be intellectually honest on my part. I was party to President Sarkozy’s extremely clear message to Mr Déby. I did not get the impression there was any kind of alliance of interests between the French President, in other words, France's most senior representative, and President Déby. The tone, content and substance of the message were entirely unambiguous. I must say that his words left a very favourable impression. In my presence he clearly spoke out to Mr Déby against the arbitrary extrajudicial arrests and the fact that nobody knew where the missing people were, and he strongly emphasised the need for inclusive dialogue involving every single party.
Concerning the deployment of EUFOR MINURCAT, we are pleased to report the redeployment of EUFOR Chad/Central African Republic on Tuesday, 12 February. EUFOR, of course, is an essential contribution by the EU to the protection of the civil population in eastern Chad and to regional stabilisation. I do not agree with those who oppose this as I feel that they are wrong to underestimate the importance of this mission or even to say we have no business going there; that is not my position at all. The European Commission has drawn up an action plan to accompany the stabilisation process, to support the voluntary return of displaced populations to their original villages and to relaunch development in the areas of eastern Chad affected by the conflict.
The EUFOR mission – which now consists of 600 men, 380 of whom are posted in Abéché – was deployed on 12 February 2008 and is due to achieve its initial operating capacity by mid-March and its full operating capacity by June, i.e. 3 700 men, which should ensure deployment of MINURCAT. Deployment of MINURCAT is crucial in terms of providing security and protection for civilians in eastern Chad, and obviously also contributes to monitoring and the promotion and defence of human rights. It is an extremely important committed observer. Deployment of MINURCAT is all the more important because the Commission made arrangements for a programme to monitor the legal and prisons system in 2007 and reform the security system by 2008-2011. We would remind the House that the Chadian authorities must approve the MINURCAT operating procedures as soon as possible because any additional delays could obviously affect the deployment schedule for the Chad humanitarian protection police force, more than half of the budget for which is financed by the Commission.
I would like to say a few words on Community support in eastern Chad. The Commission has been providing humanitarian aid to eastern Chad since 2004, and aid in 2007 totalled EUR 30 million. The European Commission also allocated EUR 10 million to deployment of the MINURCAT police force. Through the 9th European Development Fund it has allocated over EUR 13 million to implement a rehabilitation support programme for Chad and the Central African Republic. It has also agreed to support, within its means, a process of reconciliation between the ethnic groups that clashed in 2006 and have had no further relations since a wave of massive population displacements. Implementation of these programmes, however, requires lasting stabilisation of the sub-region."@en1
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