Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2013-02-07-Speech-4-411-000"
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"en.20130207.32.4-411-000"2
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"Mr President, the situation in Zimbabwe with the increase in intimidation, arbitrary arrests, judicial harassment, disappearances of human rights activists and also, of course, of political opponents of Robert Mugabe and his ZANU-PF is extremely worrying. Unfortunately, I have to say that it is not particularly surprising.
We are now in the run-up to an election in Zimbabwe and if we look back at history over the last few elections, we saw exactly the same sort of thing happening, with ZANU-PF repressing political opposition, and I have to say that this is absolutely unacceptable.
Now freedom of assembly and freedom of association and expression are essential components of any democracy, and are particularly so when a democracy is preparing for an election. I am often asked what the European Parliament in the European Union can do to defend human rights and fundamental freedoms around the world. Well, we can do a bit by raising awareness in debates like this today, but we have to follow this up with some diplomatic pressure. However, we can also use the tools which are at our disposal.
For instance in the case of EU development cooperation, this has been currently suspended, so this is the sort of pressure we can and are using. In many cases we also use strong human rights clauses in trade agreements, and I have to say that I deplore the fact that our partnership agreement with Zimbabwe is still lacking such a strong clause and I suggest that we try at the next opportunity to put that right."@en1
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