Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2013-05-22-Speech-3-648-000"
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"en.20130522.36.3-648-000"2
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"Mr President, there is no doubt that we are witnessing remarkable progress in Burma. The steps that the country has taken towards democratisation and transition from military rule should be recognised by this House. But we also have to recognise that the country has started this process from an incredibly closed and repressive situation. And, while it has come a long way, it still has a long way to go in terms of opening up, and modernising and democratising the country.
Finally and very briefly, there are serious problems with ethnic strife in Burma, but we should not be surprised that we are now receiving reports of that. When you take the lid off a kettle, some of the steam is going to come out. That is not excusing the strife that exists there but simply saying we are now getting it reported. It is not necessarily new and we have to encourage the Burmese Government to take action to reconcile itself with the Muslim and other minority communities.
The proposal we have before us tonight is to reinstate trade preferences. After such a long period of suspension, it was difficult to assess whether we should carry out this action and therefore we have had to take our guidance, as the rules anyway suggest we should, from the International Labour Organisation and the ILO has concluded that forced labour, the original reason for removing Burma’s preferences, is no longer, I quote, ‘a serious and systematic problem in Burma’. That does not mean of course that forced labour does not continue to exist in Burma – it is simply saying it is no longer serious and systematic.
If we believe in a fair rules-based trading system, and I do, then it is important to acknowledge the steps that Burma has taken and that these merit reinstatement of its preferential trading scheme.
GSP is a carrot and stick approach to trade policy. In order to continue to benefit from trade preferences, Burma will be required to maintain and improve democratisation and respect for human rights and, of course, it is our task to continue to monitor that progress.
Sanctions have been in place between the EU and Burma since 1996. Given how remarkably closed the country has been for so long and the fragile state it is now in, I think it is clear that Burma is a rather unique case, and in this respect I welcome the announcement by the High Representative Cathy Ashton in recent weeks that a Myanmar-EU task force will be established to strengthen economic cooperation.
At the same time as we have the opening of this fragile country with a precarious human rights situation, we see what can be described as almost an unseemly rush by developed countries’ industries to move into Burma.
Of course, we should welcome investment in Burma to help modernise the country, but we have to ensure that European Union industries and European companies that move into Burma respect freedom of association, encourage civil society participation and do nothing to exacerbate the ethnic conflict that exists within Burma. That is why, accompanying our approval for reinstating GSP, we have argued for strong CSR conditions, CSR policies, to be attached to the reopening of the Burmese market.
I want the European Union to ensure that it monitors the CSR situation in Burma and that it follows roughly, and I say only roughly, the guidelines that the United States has set out for its country operating within Burma.
As a Union, we have to encourage best practice by European companies operating in the Burmese economy, and we have to ensure that, when the transparency and accounting directives are passed which are being negotiated between our institutions at the present time, they are properly applied and monitored in the Burmese situation. But of course they will only apply to extractive industries, so we need wider controls."@en1
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