Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2010-03-10-Speech-3-323"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20100310.22.3-323"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spoken text |
"Mr President, when Denmark joined the EU in 1973, the EU assumed an Arctic dimension through the Danish dependency of Greenland. In 1985, Greenland chose to leave the EU but, when Sweden and Finland joined 10 years later, they substantially enlarged the EU’s interest in the Arctic region.
Since then, the EU has become one of the many actors with a vital strategic interest in the Arctic – its environment and its natural resources. As countries with territory in the Arctic, the United States, Canada, Russia, Norway and Iceland all defend their interests robustly and vigorously. The European Union should not hesitate now to do so as well and the Arctic Council, in my view, is the best arena in which to do so. The Union’s ad hoc observer status in the Arctic Council is inadequate for this purpose. I hope that the High Representative will insist on permanent observer status for the EU at the next ministerial meeting in April next year in Greenland.
It is regrettable that Canada is blocking the EU in retaliation for the Union’s ban on seal products, and I hope that, eventually, common sense will prevail. This approach makes little sense, given the fact that six EU Member States, including the United Kingdom – my own – are permanent observers. Nevertheless, the coordination between Denmark, Sweden and Finland on the Arctic Council has been exemplary and has served as a platform for the EU’s wider interest to be heard in the region.
The contributions of our ally, Norway, and Iceland, now an aspiring EU Member State, have further galvanised European participation in the Arctic Forum. This is vital because Russia has left us in little doubt as to its own designs on the Arctic, famously planting a Russian flag on the seabed of the North Pole in 2007. We know to our cost that Russia sometimes follows its own rule book in international affairs. Only a united front by other members and the observers on the Arctic Council, working through the EU’s Northern Dimension policy, will keep the Kremlin in check. We cannot allow the Arctic to become the new arena for Russia’s expansionist tendencies."@en1
|
| lpv:spokenAs | |
| lpv:unclassifiedMetadata | |
| lpv:videoURI |
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples