Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2012-07-04-Speech-3-079-000"
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"en.20120704.3.3-079-000"2
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".
Mr President, firstly may I warmly thank the chairs of the political groups for their kind words about the Cypriot Presidency and our country’s preparations to assume the duties of Presidency of the Council.
As far as Cyprus and the Cyprus problem are concerned, may I say to Mr Watson, with whom we have discussed the Cyprus problem for years, because I am a member of the Turkish-Cypriot contact group, that he should not be coming to me with calls to talk to Turkey. You should be calling on Turkey, Mr Watson, and telling them to ‘talk to Christofias’, because they refuse to talk to Christofias. Here too, Turkey is to blame for reasons of principle.
I have said to Mr Erdogan: ‘Prime Minister, please agree to talks, because I have a vision that I want to explain to you that concerns both Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots and which, at the end of the day, is also in Turkey’s interests’. I do not entertain any feelings of hostility towards the Turkish people. On the contrary, I am ready to fight side by side with the Turkish man in the street fighting for his democratic rights even now, in a Turkey of change and modernisation, because there are serious problems of abuse of the human rights of Turks, Kurds and various other communities in Turkey.
Turkey is an occupying force and I wish to emphasise that. As a body and for reasons of principle, the European Union should, in my opinion, condemn any action by Turkey which undermines the role of the Republic of Cyprus as a state, not simply as a Member State of the Union, but also as a member of all the international organisations, starting with the United Nations. We cannot allow Turkey to act in this way.
I am fully prepared. My five years in the president’s office have been years of continuous, unremitting, tireless effort to instigate dialogue and resolve the Cyprus problem. At the end of the day, when I decided to fight my friend Giannakis for the president’s office, I made a clear statement that the first or even the sole reason I was seeking election as president of the Republic of Cyprus was to work hard, on the basis of my good relations with numerous Turkish Cypriots and Turkish-Cypriot political parties, to work hard and tirelessly to unify my homeland.
I am absolutely in favour of peaceful coexistence and brotherly cooperation between Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots. Cyprus belongs to the Cypriots, be they Greek Cypriots or Turkish Cypriots or Maronites or Armenians or Roman Catholics. You see, we are a multicultural country and because I am also a little internationalist – as communists tend to be – I want us all to work together for the good of our country, as the bosses of our homeland. The British have no place in Cyprus, the Turks have no place in Cyprus and our brothers the Greeks, in the bad sense, have no place in Cyprus.
We need to be left free and you can be sure that then we shall have privileged relations both with Turkey and with Britain and, of course, with Greece. Privileged and very close and very good relations.
That is my promise to the Cypriot people, which I confirm before the European Parliament, this wonderful chamber of the European Union.
I have given my very best. There has been no response from Turkey, because Turkey has expansionist policies towards Cyprus and expansionist plans. I am sorry to have to say so, but those are the facts.
I shall persist until the end of my term of office. I know that, once my term of office ends, I shall not seek re-election as president of the Republic; however, until my term of office ends, up to the very last moment, I shall continue to fight tirelessly to restore my homeland and, of course, for a Union which is a Union for its citizens, for the nations of Europe.
We have a hot potato in our hands: the multiannual financial framework. We shall do our very best to find compromise solutions, but we shall insist on growth and social cohesion.
Please be assured that, for us, this is very important and encouraging, because we represent a small country which aims to serve the Union impartially, without any national interest, without wanting to promote its interests, for the simple reason that it is a small country and a new member of the Union and, as various speakers said, the Cypriots are decent and humane and want to honour both their country and the Union.
Freedom of the markets is one thing; unaccountability of the markets is another. I am opposed to the unaccountability of the markets and I say so frankly. The governments elected by the people to govern them need to intervene. We cannot be governed by the markets. The governments democratically elected by the people must govern.
I give my word that all the matters raised have been noted. Of course, I do not want to comment on everything; very important suggestions and proposals have been made and will be taken into serious consideration; in cooperation with President Schulz, with the European Parliament and with President Barroso, we shall try to find solutions which will best serve a collective approach to the Union’s problems.
Thank you so much for listening and thank you so much, once again, for your opinions and comments, which will be taken into serious consideration.
Serious problems exist. I noted, of course, some complaints. That is no coincidence. The complaints stem from the serious problems we face, primarily the economic and social problems, as a Union and as individual countries.
How can we address them? We need to take a unified approach. The Union institutions need to cooperate very closely. What I said in my introduction were not figures of speech. Without agreement and daily contact between the institutions, we shall achieve nothing whatsoever. We shall continue to hold debates and apportion blame; some will blame the Council, some will blame the Commission, some will say that the European Parliament is not being straight and, as I am sure realise, we shall have zero results.
The European Union is a Union of compromises, whether we like it or not, because we represent different countries, sometimes with different interests. We, as an honest and objective mediator, will try to intervene in order to reconcile positions, views and policies. We shall try something new: to ‘marry’ budgetary discipline with growth and social cohesion. I would like to believe that this is something new. Let us try, because the methods we have tried so far have taken us deeper into recession. That does the Union no honour.
The people expect a lot from the European Union. When we unanimously decided that our country should join the European Union, the Cypriot people celebrated and breathed a sigh of relief at the thought of joining this large family. They saw a better future ahead. At present, no one, neither the man in the street nor nations as a whole, sees a better future ahead and this should concern us.
We do not advocate communist policies. I make a point of that, because various things have been said, such as ‘the communist president’ and so forth. I am who I am and I am very proud of what I am. I lead a party that has served the Cypriot nation and democracy for 90 years, a party that took part
in the war against fascism and numbered many victims, that defended democracy following the coup d’état and used peaceful means to obtain independence from its colonial rulers. My party is at the vanguard here. That is why, regardless of what happened in the Soviet Union or in any other country, I can talk about the Progressive Party for the Working People (AKEL), I can talk about Cyprus and about myself as fighters for democracy. I think that the five years during which we have governed the country are proof positive of that.
Have Mr Kasoulides or Mr Mavronikolas or Ms Theocharous ever felt that the democratic rights of the Cypriot people were being cut or abused during my presidency? Did my friends feel, during the seven years that Christofias presided over the House of Representatives, that their rights were being cut and did they see any abuse of their rights on the benches? On the contrary, democracy is alive and well in Cyprus and we are all proud of that.
Therefore, please do not worry that the communist will harm Europe. The communist will strive for a better Europe, with more social justice. This is my manifesto and I shall fight for it within the framework of the institutions of the European Union. I shall not be leading a revolution, do not fear."@en1
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