Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2010-12-15-Speech-3-483"
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"en.20101215.27.3-483"2
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"Madam President, Madam High Representative, I am very pleased to see you here today participating in this particularly important discussion. In particular because these are the first political debates that Baroness Ashton has participated in since the launch of the new European External Action Service.
The Annual Report on Human Rights in the World adopted by the Council of the European Union and EU policy in this field are the basis of this discussion and the European Parliament resolution, on which we will vote tomorrow. We cannot hold Baroness Ashton responsible for those actions that are discussed in the above report, that is 2008-2009, because at that point she had not yet assumed the post of High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy. We understand the great responsibility that lies with you, both now and in the future, and I would like to assure you that we in the European Parliament will do all we can to ensure that the European Union’s objectives in the area of foreign policy are realised.
Baroness Ashton, the Treaty of Lisbon has been in force for a year and the European External Action Service became operational barely a fortnight ago. In its report today the European Parliament sends a clear signal to all EU institutions. The European Parliament has clearly expressed its position that in the new European External Action Service the primary focus should be democracy-building and human rights protection across the globe and that this should be reflected both in the structure of the service and its funding. There could be a Human Rights and Democracy Directorate, an international law directorate or a structure with another name but the same content. What we should avoid is the marginalisation of human rights issues or their exclusion from the main EU agenda and the structure of the EEAS.
With the same aim in mind, the European Parliament proposes to create special representatives for human rights within the context of the service, who would work in specific countries or regions, especially those where the EU does not have diplomatic representations. These special representatives would have a clear mandate to defend human rights in the countries where they work.
I would also like to stress once more the need for a Brussels-based Working Group on Human Rights (COHOM), all the more so because an absolute majority of EU Member States support this idea. The report on which we will vote tomorrow, here in the European Parliament, discusses and assesses EU policy, the work of the entire European Union and its institutions, covering a whole range of topics and issues, including the abolition of the death penalty, the fight against terrorism and human rights, children’s rights, combating violence against women, the situation of human rights defenders in various countries across the globe and freedom of religion or belief. We are discussing and assessing the functioning of the European Union in international fora, such as the United Nations, the United Nations Human Rights Council and the cooperation of the European Union with the International Criminal Court.
My colleagues in the European Parliament played an active part in the preparation of the report we are debating and it was adopted in the Committee on Foreign Affairs by a huge majority: 50 ‘for’, none ‘against’ and two abstentions. It is appended with a list of specific human rights violations in various countries, to which the European Parliament has drawn attention. These are actual names, countries, human destinies and lost lives. I would therefore like to end my speech by mentioning a few specific severe cases of human rights violations.
Of course, having taken part in the ceremony, you are aware that today the European Parliament was supposed to award the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought to the Cuban dissident Mr Guillermo Farinas. We were unable to do this because representatives of the Cuban Government refused to allow Mr Farinas to come to the European Parliament. We trust that in exercising your responsibilities, you will take this fact into account and will find a means of expressing our position, our disappointment and our regret and opposition in this matter to the Cuban Government.
I would also like to draw your attention to another painful case that we discuss in our report. Russia’s Khamovinicheskii Court was supposed to pass sentence on one of them today, but for reasons that are unclear it postponed the announcement until the end of the month. This is the trial of Mikhail Khodorkovskii and Platon Lebedev, which in my opinion mirrors the rotten state of the judicial system and the absence of the rule of law in Russia. Baroness Ashton, I would like to urge you not to forget these cases and to make efforts to ensure that justice in Russia becomes the rule rather than the exception. I believe that the current opening up of Russia and President Medvedev’s aims to modernise Russia are a very good opportunity to achieve the implementation of this objective."@en1
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