GwendalTsang/DEFT09-parquet huggingface dataset:
Mr President, we had a welcome visit yesterday to this Parliament from a delegation from the CIS Parliamentary Assembly. This gave us a unique opportunity to discuss Russia’s war with Chechnya face-to-face with other Parliamentarians. These visitors appealed to us to understand that, in their words, Russia was fighting against terrorism and was not waging a real war, and that this fight against terrorism had been exacerbated by outside arms flows and training camps sponsored by predatory nations jealous of Russia’s power. We responded. Russia is a member of the Council of Europe, and even her need in terms of security to protect her citizens internally from outside assault could not absolve her from her responsibilities under international conventions. I put the point that the containment by Russia of arms flows from Russia would be a very welcome step forward in terms of shared efforts to combat terrorism. There are, however, two sides to this political tale of war and suffering, and I think we must seek more strongly to understand the causes of conflict between Russia and Chechnya, so that we can help to stem the flow of human blood more quickly another time. I suggest no sanctions, no economic sanctions against Russia should be considered at this time. We have a duty, now that the war is almost over, to have access to victims and to give aid for rehabilitation. IN THE CHAIR: MR MARINHOVice-President

Political group: ELDR
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, the Lisbon strategy can only succeed if we promote competition between the European systems. In other words, we are concerned here with competition between economic solutions and, above all, with the best solutions to emerge from competition between the EU governments. That also ties in with the basic idea of subsidiarity in Europe. To put it in plain language, there should simply be no further increase in cooperation concerning economic policy, meaning that macro-economic policy ought quite simply not to fall within the competence of the EU. Socio-political objectives too, such as bringing about full employment, promoting social cohesion or establishing a balanced relationship between competition and public service are contrary to the principles of subsidiarity and competition. Moreover, we should – in my view, anyway – also take care that such objectives do not find their way into the EU constitution. What is more, we also need competition in the tax field, that is to say between European tax systems. Nor, above all, should we go on using the open coordination method in the form currently under discussion. In other words, we need, in the future too, an economic policy for which the Member States themselves continue to be responsible. In my view, only competition between economic policy objectives will, in the end, also lead to local conditions within the European Union that, against the background of general worldwide competition, may be further strengthened.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, the Commission’s report states that 1998 saw the consolidation of the trans-European networks and outlines the progress made with various projects in the area of transport, energy and tele- and data communications. It must, however, be pointed out that the European Union’s budgetary resources fall considerably short of the requirements and the challenge generated by the establishment of a trans-European transport network. Unless there is an increase in the financial contribution made by national, regional and local public bodies and by the private sector, we will not see any significant progress in this area in the foreseeable future. I should nevertheless like to stress the fact that recourse to private finance should never be an obstacle to the development of communications in regions which currently have a per capita income well below the Community average. With regard to the future review of the guidelines for trans-European transport networks, I feel I must once again draw the Commission’s attention to the need to attach greater importance to improving access to Europe’s remote and isolated regions, and to focus particularly on establishing sustainable transport networks. The impact of such investments on the economy of these regions and on employment is a crucial factor in the socio-economic development of these regions. The Commission’s work programme for the year 2000 lays down that the review of the guidelines for trans-European transport networks must concentrate on reducing bottlenecks in order to rationalise traffic in Europe and to make it flow more freely. As I understand it, this amounts to saying that the review currently being prepared will mainly concern the central regions of the European Union, which are the main victims of these congestion problems. I can only hope that this hypothesis does not mean that the remote and, to an even greater extent, the extremely remote regions might only be incidentally affected by this review. This fear, which has been mentioned several times by many of my colleagues, led me to table an amendment to this effect, which was adopted by the Committee on Regional Policy, Transport and Tourism and which features in Mr Hatzidakis’s excellent report. I would be most grateful to you, Commissioner, if, today, you could allay my concerns.

Political group: PPE-DE
The main reason for our voting against this joint resolution is the approval of parts of the resolution that seek to justify war and US intervention in Afghanistan, a situation which is all the more serious because of all of the US pressure for a new war against Iraq. In fact, we totally disagree with resorting to war to resolve the problems of terrorism. As we have stated repeatedly, there are other ways of combating terrorism, such as acting to resolve its direct and indirect causes. By the same token, we cannot accept the calling into question of fundamental rights and freedoms or the practice of State terrorism on the pretext of combating terrorism. Nevertheless, we welcome – which is why we have voted in favour of this point – the approval of the request for a detailed investigation, under the auspices of the United Nations, of the allegations of massacres and war crimes, which our group has condemned on more than one occasion, specifically by inviting the film-maker Jamie Doran to show his film in the European Parliament on 12 June. We also support the call for greater financial aid for the economic and social reconstruction of the country and urgent humanitarian aid.

Political group: GUE-NGL
chairman of the Committee on Citizen’s Freedoms and Rights, Justice and Home Affairs. – Mr President, 12 August 1949 is a day which the ancient Romans would have said should be marked with a red stone. It signified a great step forward for mankind – and yet in the fifty years since, although our own half-continent has lived in peace, more people have died in armed conflict than died in the whole of World War II. We have failed to spread the lessons and values learned from that conflict. Too often our own Member States have been parties to conflict, either through the production and sales of weapons, through the production and distribution of landmines or through the temptation – in the words of a great Victorian statesman in my country – to prefer their wars to be fought at a distance and wherever possible in the name of God. We have failed to educate against the glorification of combat in our own communities. We have failed to educate against the problems and the scourge of racism and xenophobia. Yet, thanks to global communications, we have a constant reminder now on our television screens of the terrible effects of man's inhumanity to man, and of course to woman and child. We have seen recently in the former Yugoslavia, and now in Chechnya, the terrible effects of armed conflict and we see, furthermore, the effect of governments' efforts to suppress independent media comment on such conflicts, and the development towards totalitarian government. If the European Union is to become a community of values – if we are to play a true role in the new global governance, then we need to be promoting the values of the Geneva Conventions not only to our own soldiers and security forces, but also to people in our civilian societies. We need to be pushing for the creation of a permanent international criminal court and urging our own Member States to sign and ratify the Convention. We need to be working hard to combat racism and xenophobia. Liberal Democrats in this House are proud that three of the authors of today's reports, Mrs Malmström, Mrs Haarder and Baroness Ludford have grappled with these issues and given the House these reports today. We live in hope that the twentieth century, which Europe has soaked in blood, can give way to a twenty-first century in which the power, the genius and the enthusiasm of humankind can be applied to the construction of a more just, peaceful and sustainable world.

Political group: ELDR
Madam President, I agree that we should have the Commissioner here when we discuss Chechnya. I also agree that we should discuss the situation in Chechnya at 3 p.m., but I would like to request that the debate on the Intergovernmental Conference should be taken in one go. I support Mr Barón Crespo’s idea of waiting until we have completed the debate and then finishing with the “Questions to the Council” agenda item. It would be wrong to consider a topic as important as the Intergovernmental Conference in bits and pieces, with a little bit on Wednesday and then perhaps another bit on Thursday morning. We should be able to debate this subject without interruption.

Political group: PSE
Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to start by acknowledging the great work done by Mrs Corbey in drawing up this report. It is clear that in this particular case we are dealing with a directive whose implementation has been very complicated in the majority of Member States, given that the fine-tuning of the mechanisms needed to meet the objectives of the directive is in itself a very complicated issue. It is one thing to issue a piece of legislation, because everything holds up on paper, and a completely different thing to put it into practice. I thank the rapporteur for the commitments we have been able to make and I regret that we could not agree on certain points, which are by no means trivial ones. Firstly I would like to make it patently clear that this should have been a report on the implementation of the directive on packaging, but it has turned into a report that is trying to tell the Commission the direction it should be taking with regard to the revision of the directive in question. It is a clear example of the temptation that we frequently give into in this Parliament, which is to forget that it is the Commission that holds the legislative initiative. We in the Group of the European People’s Party propose the following: Firstly, that the objectives for the prevention and reduction of packaging waste should not be binding, nor should they be classified by material, in order that competitiveness is maintained between them. For we should not forget that the legal basis of this directive is the environment and also the internal market. We think, however, that these objectives should be linked to the quantity of the product that is packaged and put on the market. Secondly: the responsibility for the prevention and removal of packaging and packaging waste must be shared between producers, packaging companies, retailers and consumers, and not only the producer, as the draft report proposes. Thirdly: Life Cycle Analysis is a very useful method from an environmental point of view, that should be taken into account, but it cannot be proposed as the standard norm to ensure that the requirements of Annex II are being met. These standard norms should be issued by the European Committee for Standardisation and this body, in turn, should continue working in this direction. Fourthly, we are against introducing any other new standard apart from the so-called ‘green dot’, already in use in most countries. Lastly, we propose that the recitals alluding to the situation in specific Member States in 1998 with regard to compliance with the objectives of the directive be removed, for at this time the directive was in the process of being transposed, and the data, and I quote directly from recital B, “are not meaningful for the purpose of assessing the real degree to which the directive's objectives have been met”.

Political group: PPE-DE
Mr President-in-Office, you spoke of a great Europe and, indeed, with the arrival of the new countries, we are experiencing a moment of Europe’s reconciliation with its own history and its own civilisation. Europe will only be great, however, if it can preserve its ability to compete in the economic field. As you said, Europe will be able to exert influence if it can act decisively. If, today, there is a ghost haunting Europe, it is the risk of losing its competitive ability on a world scale. I therefore applaud your mention of the Lisbon strategy and also the reference in your programme to competitiveness in the service of shared prosperity. Since Lisbon, Mr President-in-Office, three years have been wasted – and I mean wasted. That is why it is right to seek new lines of development and new economic instruments, as you have done. We need imagination, we need the ability to see beyond what is obvious, and therefore the proposal to build up our infrastructure, both tangible and intangible (such as human resources and research), by mobilising private resources as well as public funds is the right road. It is also necessary to bring the subject of a sustainable pensions system to European Union level. Many of us, in this Parliament and outside, are convinced that your Presidency will be the key to success in this critical period in the construction of a united Europe. I should like to remind those who today have brought us the venom of a certain mediocre kind of Italian politics that in a democracy it is the citizens’ votes that give legitimacy, and nothing else. Perhaps for them the concept of democracy is too recent for them to have adopted it completely. We, as Italians and Europeans, are proud that you are going to lead Europe for these six months. I wish you every success in your work, Mr President-in-Office!

Political group: PPE-DE
My group agrees with Mr Pohjamo's own-initiative report. Positive effects have not yet been forthcoming, to the extent we had hoped, from the current provisions of the law and from the reform of the structural funds within the Agenda 2000 framework. The following, in particular, need to be optimised: - the lengthy negotiations on programmes between the Commission and the Member States - the complicated financial provisions - the involvement of the regions in the implementation of programmes and projects - the expenditure on administration, and - the non-binding nature of the monitoring of project implementation. Unless further structural changes are made in the administration of the Structural Funds, it will continue to be scarcely possible to resolve the problem posed by the decrease in disparities between the Member States not being reflected by a decrease in those between the regions within them. Such changes must, in particular, cover the following aspects: - time limits on projects - discontinuance of the financing of projects, the realisation of which overruns the timescale envisaged - the redistribution of Structural Funds resources from countries not availing themselves of them to those which have submitted sufficient qualifying projects - greater weight to be given to infrastructure projects which promote employment. Enlargement of the EU makes it a matter of urgent necessity that the Commission should produce, by 2003 at the latest, definite proposals to guarantee that present Member States should suffer no detriment as regards structural resources and that the countries that are candidates for accession should be treated equally in line with the tasks of a common structural policy. There is no other way to achieve the objective of long-term reduction of existing differences in levels of development and the consequent enhancement of economic and social cohesion. The amendments tabled by my group have also supported this statement of political objectives.

Political group: GUE-NGL
When viewed solely from the point of view of cosmetics, the outcome of the conciliation can be described as good. The industrial lobby has once again triumphed over the interests of animals who suffer unnecessarily. Europeans will only allow animal testing if it is absolutely necessary. This necessity does not apply to beauty products, so this directive should have implemented an unconditional ban on the sale and testing of these cosmetics. There is no such ban, however. The standpoint taken by our Parliament was already a compromise, but the outcome that has now been achieved makes things even worse. A partial prohibition will not enter into force until 2009, and three tests will be allowed to continue until as late as 2013 and perhaps even after that. It is not the Parliamentary delegation in the conciliation committee who is to blame for this flawed compromise but the Commission and the Council who have unilaterally bowed to pressure from the cosmetics industry. Better information for the consumer will hopefully result in consumers not wanting to become more beautiful by buying ‘ugly’ cosmetics. It is of the greatest importance that governments, science and industry invest in alternative methods. There is nothing at all wrong with a constant stream of new cosmetics coming on to the market; it must just not be at the expense of animals suffering unnecessarily. There are already very many products on the market which contain very many safe ingredients that have been tested on animals, and as far as I am concerned, that is enough now. This directive makes Europe look ugly, so I will not be supporting it.

Political group: ELDR
Mr President, we in the Socialist Group and the European Parliament need to send a clear message to the Cameroon authorities. In order for the Cotonou Agreement to be effective and credible, the European Union needs all the ACP countries, including Cameroon, of course, to use actions to demonstrate their unequivocal commitment to democratic values. The governments and in particular the State security forces of all the countries associated with the European Union need to have a clear understanding that security and public order cannot come before the exercise of people’s freedoms, not to mention their physical safety. Cameroon is an important country in the regional context, whose indicators paint a hopeful picture of the economic situation, but we are obliged to look beyond this positive outlook and ask the government of Cameroon to make a greater effort to maintain the rule of law and to respect the rights of its population. Similarly, we must ask the government of Cameroon to comply with the recommendations of the United Nations, which has already asked it to reform the structure and activity of its security forces, in order to ensure that they are made up of regular members and always act within the limits of the law. Cameroon must understand that by making this effort, not only will it be satisfying the European Union and the other countries, but it will also be working in the interests of its own people. Also, it is good for the whole of the African continent that European cooperation with Africa, both under the Cotonou Agreement and under bilateral cooperation with our countries, should be governed by respect for the values of freedom that we all profess to share. I would like to finish by doing what my colleague Mr MacCormick did and also recognise the work and action of some non-governmental organisations such as FiACAT, which has passed on information and concerns to us in its constant monitoring of the situation in Cameroon. We want to encourage local organisations even more, such as ‘Action by Christians for the Abolition of Torture’, which are on permanent alert on the ground and have consequently been victims of injustice. They deserve and have our solidarity. Press freedom in the world

Political group: PSE
Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, as a member of the Confederal Group of the , I do of course share many of the concerns held by the majority of my group. Like them, I am particularly concerned by one question. How can we possibly develop a defence structure when we have not yet established a common foreign policy? I would like to add that I am also vehemently opposed to the very principle of a pre-emptive war like the one underway in Iraq. I deplore the disagreement between the countries of Europe on this important issue. Clearly NATO is already dominated by the United States. I have to say that if Europe does not wish to reinforce this monopoly, and if we in Europe want to be able to settle conflicts through effective and strong European diplomacy, we must establish a European defence architecture. We must ensure such a European defence has clear objectives and principles. It must fulfil specific missions using appropriate capacities and arms. It must depend on a legitimate and democratic decision-making process. In my opinion, conflicts throughout the world should be settled through diplomatic means, within the framework of the United Nations in particular. In order to have sufficient diplomatic clout to be able to solve these problems through diplomacy, Europe needs to have the ability to take military action. I think we in Europe should not deny ourselves this capacity. In short, if Europe no longer wishes to leave its future in the hands of the United States, it must provide itself with the necessary means so that a European defence architecture can at last be established.

Political group: GUE-NGL