GwendalTsang/DEFT09-parquet huggingface dataset:
Mr President, the excellent report by our colleague, Mrs Matikainen-Kallström, on supplementary assistance for the budget of Moldova gives us a rare opportunity to cast our eyes on this small country on the periphery of the European Union, on its economic development and political orientation. The people once again find themselves living in poverty. The average monthly per capita income in Moldova is only approximately EUR 30. Privatisation is making only slow headway and so far the country has not managed to entirely resolve the problem of integrating its Russian minority groups. It has still not achieved monetary or budgetary stability and Russian occupation troops are still stationed in part of the country, in Trans-Dnestr. For days now, there has been a very real risk of all the lights going out in Moldova. The Russian energy company Gazprom suspended gas supplies because Moldova could not pay its bills in German Marks and US dollars. So we are quite literally witnessing this country’s almost desperate fight for economic survival and political existence. Geographically, Moldova is a narrow strip of land between Ukraine and Romania. Many young Moldovans are looking towards the European Union. Some are studying at our universities and technical colleges thanks to funding from the European Union and its Member States. At home, most of them want Moldova to become more open to the European Union. How can we, the European Parliament, make it easier for Moldova to become more open? The macro-economic financial assistance, which the Group of the European People’s Party firmly support, is an important step towards building up the necessary confidence in the Moldovan administration system and thereby consolidating its budget. Moreover, the aid under the TACIS programmes must concentrate more on vocational training, education and improving the totally outmoded transport, communications and energy infrastructure. Small crafts and services businesses can only be started up if there are prospects of improving the framework conditions for competition and investment, which is only feasible in the long term with the help of the European Union. But Moldova must also know where it wants to go. Does it want to remain in a state of insecurity because it relies so heavily on cheap Russian raw materials, which it cannot even pay for yet, and also remain incapable of reform in many areas, which would mean tying its long-term future to the imponderables of Russian economic and social development? Or does it want to follow the example of Romania and resolutely tread the long and difficult road of economic reforms and closer cooperation with the European Union? In that case, it also deserves stronger support on our part. That support must be conditional on a radical modernisation of its economy and administration. We hope Moldova will opt for renewal and for Europe.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, Nigeria has ratified a number of international conventions on human rights, in particular the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the Convention on the Elimination of All forms of Discrimination Against Women, and the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights. Despite this, however, here we are once again discussing the violation of women’s rights, pointing out that the death penalty still exists in Nigeria, declaring that current practice and the countless regulations contained in the new codes of criminal procedure of the Sharia continue to further the severe violation of human rights, even to the point of enforcing the death penalty. We, together with many men and women of democratic countries, have roused ourselves to action, and that is what saved the lives of Safiya and of Hafsatu, but, despite this victory, the Islamic court in Bakori has condemned another woman, Mrs Amina Lawal, to being stoned to death. Now, I do not feel we can continue – although we must do so – to discuss these massacres. We must demand that Nigeria, which is preparing for democratic elections and must therefore be supported by the European Union, not merely – as has been mentioned in the context of the Cotonou Agreement – consolidate pluralist democracy and social and economic justice, but that it put an end to these violations too. I feel that we can no longer be content with just discussing the ongoing violations and waiting for something to happen. We must be more resolute and take action using all the tools available to us.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, the violence in Indonesia is unremitting. For a number of years, there have been problems in Timor, mainly concentrated in West Timor at the moment, as well as in the Moluccas, in Aceh, in Irian Jaya and now again in Kalimantan. The old Suharto regime has in the past forced more than 8 million Indonesians to move from overpopulated regions to regions with a low population rate. For example, a few hundred thousand people moved from the island of Madura to Kalimantan, formerly Borneo. The migrants are often given a considerable degree of preferential treatment. For example they receive land and living facilities, sometimes at the expense of the indigenous population. That is the case in Irian Jaya and the Moluccas, as well as for the people from Madura in Kalimantan. It is therefore understandable that difficulties should arise, and neither is it all that difficult to let the tensions between population groups escalate. Unfortunately, there are quite a few people and groups in Indonesia who stand to gain from an escalation in tension between regional population groups, causing the government in Jakarta to become destabilised. This whole situation has now led to hundreds of killings, and tens of thousands of refugees, in addition to more than a million internal refugees which Indonesia was already grappling with. It is a huge problem, which is threatening to get the better of the Indonesian government. In our resolution, we call on the European Commission to address the Indonesian government in a bid to halt these brutalities, and we urge the Commission to implement this resolution.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, I think it outrageous that the problem of accidents due to falls at work can give rise to some much opposition and cannot be sorted out more quickly. Yet, the rapporteur himself reminds us how urgent the matter is when he quotes a figure of 500 000 accidents per year in this sphere alone, leading to at least 40 000 cases of seriously injury and around a thousand deaths. As the rapporteur is careful to point out, however, building firms are opposed to regulation of any kind and, as a result, the report carefully avoids implicating them. Technical defects in scaffolding and other systems do cause accidents in the workplace, but the main cause is production rates, working hours and poor conditions. The report asks for employers to make arrangements at least to limit the carnage, if not to put an end to it. If emergency measures were to be agreed, forcing employers to make such arrangements, then I should immediately be all in favour of them. I doubt, however, if that would be possible, so respectful is this Parliament of employers’ interests. Meanwhile, capitalist exploitation continues to exact a heavy toll among tens of thousands of employees in terms of their health and, sometimes, their lives.

Political group: GUE-NGL
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of the delegation for relations with the South Caucasus, I would like to inform you that a member of the Commission's diplomatic staff has been the victim of an insidious murder in Georgia. I wish to ask the President, on behalf of the European Parliament, to send a communication to President Shevardnaze calling upon him not only to do everything in his power to solve this crime, but also to make sure at long last that constitutional means are used to ensure that people who work in Georgia and for Georgia are guaranteed appropriate protection, so that this essential work can be done effectively. I regard this incident as a very serious one. We want to do everything to help the South Caucasus, but the South Caucasus itself must also make efforts to protect people entrusted to its care. (Applause)

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, I speak in support of the Roth-Behrendt report and congratulate the rapporteur on the quality and thoroughness of her report. I note with approval too that the Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Consumer Policy have adopted all but one of the amendments of the Committee on Industry, External Trade, Research and Energy. Colleagues, without doubt, there is major and well-grounded public abhorrence about the use of animals for testing ingredients in cosmetics, and all concerned want better protection for animals worldwide. This has been reflected in the consistent line this Parliament has taken in the past. The cosmetics industry is about marketing glamour, dreams and illusions and I am not as critical as some previous speakers about this. Without doubt much of the responsible sector of the cosmetics industry has taken considerable strides in moving towards fewer tests on animals, but public opinion is well-grounded and it is good that it has been reflected, not just in the past, but strongly reiterated and strengthened in the Roth-Behrendt report. We cannot know about the WTO. There has been no challenge yet and the arguments in my view ring a bit hollow from the United States of America about the possible neglect of our international obligations in the same week as President Bush has so publicly repudiated the Kyoto agreement on climate change. Nevertheless, it may well be that the international cosmetics industry draws back from a WTO challenge if they know that the full glare of public scrutiny is focused on testing ingredients on animals. It is right that we hold the line. This report is well worked out in its detail. If it does lead to a challenge under the WTO rules then we from the European Union will have to argue our corner vigorously. If we listen to those arguments, we would do almost nothing in this Parliament. It is not that we are insensitive to those arguments, but that we place them in a context of what is the stronger and the greater good. I commend the Roth-Behrendt report to you.

Political group: PSE
This report contains amendments to the current regulations on the protection of Community forests against atmospheric pollution and forest fires. The amendments to the regulation on protecting forests against fires are particularly important for Portugal. In fact, we must pay considerably greater attention to the Mediterranean woodlands that have been affected by forest fires, and this requires considerable financial resources for reforestation and for the necessary fire prevention measures. For Portugal, where fires have destroyed large areas of forest, it is vital to increase appropriations in order to supplement national investment in building infrastructure, for example, and to help local authorities, private landowners’ associations or wasteland management bodies to buy fire prevention equipment. This is why the increase to EUR 77 million in Community appropriations proposed by the rapporteur as opposed to the EUR 50 million proposed by the Commission is so important. It is also important to create a Community information system on forest fires so that the situation at any given time is more widely known. This will enable us to fight more effectively against forest fires and their causes.

Political group: GUE-NGL
Mr President, I should like to explain why, tomorrow, I shall vote against the compromise proposal from the conciliation committee. The amendments adopted by Parliament during its reading of the report were a serviceable compromise between those who want a total liberalisation of port services and those who think we should take account of our workers. Unfortunately, little remains of Parliament’s amendments, which means that European port workers will face an uncertain future if the compromise is adopted. If we accept the compromise, port workers will lose their jobs, simply because seafarers on ships calling at EU ports have been allowed to handle cargoes. In that way, the EU will lose a large number of jobs. We do not want ports of convenience, just as we do not want ships sailing under flags of convenience. In Scandinavia, we have seen examples of port workers refusing to handle goods from ships on which the working and wage conditions were not in order. Now, an attempt is being made to get rid of this solidarity by means of a bad piece of EU legislation. Those campaigning for liberalisation say that not so many people are in any case employed on modern ships and that the Port Directive will not therefore mean fewer port workers. It is, however, precisely because there are not especially many people employed on modern ships that we should leave it to the competent port workers to ensure that cargoes are handled properly. Parliament’s demand for certification has, moreover, been squeezed out of the wording of the directive in the course of the conciliation committee’s work. We are now therefore opening the door to poorly trained labour that may jeopardise port security. When we talk about security in EU ports, there are two considerations to be borne in mind, namely the security of people who work in the ports and the security of the goods handled. I myself come from a seaport in Denmark, and I am very familiar indeed with the problems. We have solved them by cooperating with the larger neighbouring ports. We divide up the amount of goods and, in that way, ensure optimum use of the different ports, at the same time as preserving free competition. I would call upon everyone to vote against the compromise, for where would the unemployed port workers go? What training opportunities do they have? To my fellow MEP, Mrs Langenhagen, who was in some doubt as to how she should vote, I have to say that she should vote according to her conviction and not follow group discipline. It is too bad that group discipline is allowed to decide these matters. There is, therefore, only one way, namely to vote in accordance with one’s convictions. If, moreover, the port workers are to be given help, we can give it them by voting against this bad document from the conciliation committee.

Political group: GUE-NGL
draftsman of the opinion of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, Human Rights, Common Security and Defence Policy. – Mr President, the Foreign Affairs Committee welcomes the changes made at the committee stage of this report, for as the common asylum and immigration policy of the EU develops, it is essential that its impact on the outside world and especially upon our close neighbours is fully taken into account. These countries, many of them candidate states, are at the sharp end of the refugee problem. Most of them have no experience of refugee and asylum policy. They all lack the financial and human resources to deal competently with applications to stay. The Foreign Affairs Committee also felt it was important to insert a reference to the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights, as well as the obligation to respect all existing international law commitments. Finally, we have also insisted that the EU's new procedures should aim to contribute to the improvement of international relations by being as clear, transparent and reasoned as possible, so that their interpretation by third countries and their citizens will be facilitated.

Political group: ELDR
Mr President, I would like to make clear on behalf of the Group that we will be opposing all of the amendments by the Group and the Group. Nevertheless we find less than credible the much delayed decision by the Venezuelan National Electoral Council to reject 1.2 million out of 3 million signatures on the recall referendum; two in five signatures have actually been declared invalid. We understand the wave of protest and disturbances in Venezuela in the wake of that decision. Nevertheless, we reject unconditionally the use of violence and deeply deplore the loss of human lives. We express our sympathy with the victims of that violence. We call on the National Electoral Commission to accept and adopt forthwith the recommendations of the Organisation of American States Observation Mission and the Carter Centre in relation to their preliminary report. We endorse the Irish presidency's statements of 23 February and 2 March, and ask the Commission to use its considerable political weight in that country to ensure that the agreements made on the basis of democratic coordination are actually kept.

Political group: PSE
If Amendment 6 to Article 2 of the directive is adopted, the following explanation of vote from Parliament's Group of the Europe People's Party and will apply. The members of the Group of the Europe People's Party and choose to abstain from voting on the legislative resolution because Amendment 6 to Article 2 has been adopted. Reason: Marking toys designed for children between 3 and 6 years of age and childcare articles manufactured completely or partially from soft PVC plastic containing phthalates, and their packaging, with a warning label is very difficult and in reality is likely to be tantamount to an indirect, extended ban. The content of the decision on labelling, therefore, goes beyond the scientific grounds for the directive.

Political group: PPE-DE
draftsman of the opinion of the Committee on Industry, External Trade, Research and Energy. – Mr President, I took over the job of committee draftsman following the heart attack of Mr Desama who was originally to have done the work for the committee. We hope he will soon be back with us. My thanks and congratulations to Mr Bourlanges for his painstaking work on behalf of the Members of Parliament. The Committee on Industry covers 120 budget lines – so you can see our task is fairly complex! We cover the energy programmes, those relating to industry, including small and medium firms, the research programmes under the framework programmes which of course amount to more or less 60% of the internal policy expenditure of the European Union, and the trade and technical assistance lines. As far as the energy lines are concerned, we were sorry that the Committee on Budgets did not follow our line in increasing the expenditure for Altener and Save. Those are renewable energy and energy efficiency programmes currently in conciliation. If we get, as expected, an increase as a result of conciliation more money will, of course, be asked for next year. As far as research is concerned, and after very many long discussions with Mr Bourlanges, I am interested to know what he intends to do. We, in the Industry Committee, do not want the research programmes broken down into dozens and dozens of lines, one for each key action. But we do want to monitor each key action. I think we have reached an agreement with the Commission that information will be provided to us at intervals and in a form that allows us to monitor that spending in the way we want to. I am also sorry that the Committee on Budgets did not approve moving the training of the nuclear inspectorate in the former Soviet Union from the external policy to the energy line where that training could be done far more efficiently. We have made this argument very clearly and we will make it again. As far as monitoring is concerned, we intend in our committee to take one member responsible for monitoring each of the 120 lines. They will be expected to follow the spending, to look at the way the projects are organised, to visit the projects and to be in a position to let us know how things are going.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, I would like to make three observations in relation to what we have heard here this morning. The first observation relates to the difficulty raised by certain Members regarding the difference, in their scandalous judgment, between the pay of an MEP and that of certain political posts in candidate countries. Mr President, I believe that this difficulty makes no sense, because, within the fifteen current Member States there are also differences in income, and we are not for that reason going to establish different pay for each of them. And within each Member State there are regions with different levels of income and, as far as I know, national Members of Parliament are not paid differently according to the region they come from. Therefore, Mr President, it is entirely logical that there should be a single statute and pay should be the same for all the Member States, and observations of this type seem to me to be offensive to the candidate countries. The second observation relates to the idea that MEPs should be paid from the budgets of their respective States. Mr President, this is absurd as well, because if our function is European, our pay should come from the European budget, or are Members of Parliament in the national states paid by their constituency within the State? They are paid by the State as a whole. The third observation, Mr President, relates to the idea we have heard about the homogeneity which must exist between the pay of the European Member of Parliament and the national Member of Parliament. This is also absurd, Mr President, or is it the case that in the Member States a councillor of a small town is paid the same as a councillor of the large city, or a councillor the same as a senator? Each post receives a salary in accordance with its level and its scope. Mr President-in-Office of the Council, all the factors for resolving this problem are on the table; the ball is in your court. Resolve them once and for all, because this problem has gone on too long.

Political group: PPE-DE
Madam President, we would of course welcome a statement from Mr Verheugen. Since this is a very important issue, a statement from the Commission President would obviously be even better. But we do not insist on this. What we do insist on, however, is that the statement which Mr Verheugen eventually makes is unequivocally a declaration by the Commission as a whole, and that any misunderstandings are then cleared up. This is not then a private, personal statement by Mr Verheugen, but a clarification by the whole Commission acting as a college. (Applause)

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, we are living not only in a knowledge-based economy but also in a post-Kyoto carbon economy. Those who are able to produce goods whilst producing the least emissions will be the winners in this new economy. They will therefore be able to gain advantages in terms of employment and in economic and environmental terms. I therefore think it is extremely important that the European Union should have developed an emissions-trading system that will enable us to lower emissions in industry and in the energy sector, which accounts for fifty thousand companies and for 46% of carbon dioxide emissions. This is particularly important because it will lower the financial cost to Europe of complying with Kyoto by 35%. We cannot, however, resolve Kyoto merely through industry and energy. The Commission needs to come up with initiatives for the transport, farming and energy sectors. Despite the fact, however, that we in Europe are living in a carbon economy, we are still dependent on Russia’s agreement for the Kyoto protocol to enter into force. We also know that the United States are currently waging a campaign in Russia against the Kyoto protocol. I would ask the Council and the Commission, what measures are being worked on at European level to ensure that we can convince our Russian friends to ratify the Kyoto protocol? It is crucial that the protocol enters into force so that European businesses can accept the forthcoming measures, some of which are more difficult, to reduce carbon dioxide emissions in Europe.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, as a rights holder in this sector, I will not be taking part in the vote.

Political group: PSE