ddrg/super_eurlex huggingface dataset:
21.

Calls on the Commission to put in place a values-based EU trade policy that ensures a high level of protection for labour and environmental rights and respect for fundamental freedoms and human rights, including gender equality; recalls that all EU trade and investment agreements must be gender mainstreamed and include an ambitious and enforceable chapter on trade and sustainable development (TSD); recalls that the negotiation of trade agreements could represent an important tool for advancing gender equality and empowering women in third countries and calls for gender-disaggregated data on the impact of trade to be collected; calls for the EU and its Member States to include the country-specific and sector-specific gender impact of EU trade policy and agreements in ex-ante and ex-post impact assessments; stresses that the results of the gender-focused analysis should be taken into account in trade negotiations — considering both the positive and the negative impact throughout the whole process, from negotiation to implementation — and should be accompanied by measures to prevent or compensate possible negative effects; welcomes the Commission’s commitment to ensuring, for the first time for the EU, the inclusion of a specific gender chapter in the modernised Association Agreement between Chile and the EU and calls for the promotion of and support for the inclusion of such chapters in all further EU trade and investment agreements, building on existing international examples and on the basis of their added value following the assessments carried out;
B.

whereas the Youth Guarantee is recognised to have provided an impetus for structural reforms in public employment services and education systems in the Member States; whereas, however, it experienced a rather slow and patchy implementation by the Member States in its early stages, and several flaws were highlighted by stakeholders and young people in its design and its functioning in practice; whereas in its Special Report No 5/2017, the European Court of Auditors criticised the limited progress of the Youth Guarantee, concluding that the contribution of the Youth Employment Initiative (YEI) to the achievement of the objectives of the Youth Guarantee in the five Member States visited was very limited at the time of the audit, and that more than three years after the adoption of the Council recommendation, the situation fell short of the initial expectations raised at the launch of the Youth Guarantee, which aimed to provide a good quality offer to all NEETs — young people not in employment, education or training — within four months; whereas the Commission and the Member States have progressively introduced adjustments and improved guidance for the programme, making the Youth Guarantee and the YEI essential tools for combating youth unemployment in the EU;
3.

Is concerned that since 2015, the number of return decisions enforced has been decreasing and notes that this number does not necessarily correspond to an increase or decrease in irregular entries; stresses that an effective return policy is one of the key elements of a well-functioning EU asylum and migration policy; notes that, according to the Commission’s statement, the return rate decreased from 46 % in 2016 to 37 % in 2017 and that this may not present the full picture, owing to the inherent margin of discretion that Member States have in the implementation of the Return Directive, notably difficulties in cooperation with third countries, the fact that some Member States issue more than one return decision to one person, that decisions are not withdrawn if the return does not take place owing to humanitarian reasons, that some people are not returnable as their return would violate the principle of non-refoulement, or that some people return voluntarily without their return being registered; underlines that not every return decision is followed by swift return and readmission procedures owing to practical and legal obstacles and notes with concern that this can cause serious strain, not only on local facilities, but on the people involved;
5.

Reiterates its call on the Algerian authorities to put an end to any form of intimidation, judicial harassment, criminalisation or arbitrary arrest and detention of critical journalists, bloggers, human rights defenders, lawyers, and activists, and to take appropriate steps to ensure and guarantee to all the right to freedom of expression, association and peaceful assembly, freedom of the media, and freedom of thought, conscience and religion or belief, which are guaranteed by the Algerian Constitution and by the ICCPR, which Algeria has signed and ratified; condemns any form of excessive use of force by law enforcement officials in dispersing peaceful protests; reiterates its call on the Algerian authorities to conduct independent investigations into each case of excessive use of force by law enforcement officials, and to hold all perpetrators to account; calls on the Algerian authorities to implement their international commitments under UNCAT;
47.

Welcomes the proposal to enhance the flexibility of VET programmes, to use micro-credentials and to increase the permeability with other educational sectors, as this increased flexibility enables VET programmes to be customised to individual needs, while respecting full qualifications; notes that this initiative also allows transfers of recognition and the accumulation of learning outcomes; welcomes, in this respect, the idea of European vocational core profiles and of integration with the Europass platform, including with future individual learning accounts, which should serve to facilitate recognition of qualifications and mobility; underlines that curricula need to establish the basis to enable people to transfer between academic and vocational routes, including the competences they obtain; stresses that the qualification structure needs to allow for comparability; underlines that curricula also need to provide for the future employability of the individual by anticipating skill needs over the medium to long term; calls on the Member States to encourage the further modularisation of VET in order to build more bridges between education and training systems; stresses the importance of the ECVET system, which has provided better recognition of learning outcomes obtained during mobility periods; calls on the Member States to consider the development of the ECTS credit points system for VET; calls on the Member States to ensure that VET programmes can create higher skill levels;
22.

Believes that the scope of the future legislation should cover all listed and non-listed large undertakings established in EU territory, as defined in Article 3(4) of the Accounting Directive; stresses that in order to provide a level playing field, this legislation should also apply to non-EU companies operating in the EU market; invites the Commission to identify high-risk sectors of economic activity with a significant impact on sustainability matters that could justify applying it to SMEs in those sectors; further considers that, following the impact assessment the Commission is currently undertaking, the sustainability strategies should include measurable, specific, time-bound and science-based targets as well as transition plans aligned with the EU’s international commitments on the environment and climate change, in particular the Paris Agreement, the Convention on Biological Diversity and international agreements addressing deforestation; believes that the strategies could also include an internal policy on a fair salary based on living wage per country, a policy on gender equality, and a policy ensuring employees’ rights are better integrated in business activities; underlines that the content of these internal policies should be determined by the companies themselves, with due consideration for and in consultation with their employees; considers that these policies should take into account sector-specific and/or geographical matters and the rights of persons belonging to particularly vulnerable groups or communities; considers that linking the variable part of the remuneration of executive directors to the achievement of the measurable targets set in the strategy would serve to align directors’ interests with the long-term interests of their companies; calls on the Commission to further promote such remuneration schemes for top management positions;
8.

Is deeply concerned about the constant attacks and pressure on the opposition parties, in particular the continuous specific and politically motivated targeting of the HDP and its youth organisations by the Turkish authorities, which undermines the proper functioning of democratic system, and calls on the Turkish authorities to immediately end their crackdown against them; expresses particular concern as to the ongoing debate about the closure of the HDP and the lifting of the immunities of nine HDP MPs, both for the same Kobane protests of October 2014 for which Mr Demirtaş is being detained; highlights the case of Cihan Erdal, member of the youth wing of the Turkish Green/Left party, who was detained on 25 September 2020 and indicted on 7 January 2021 together with more than 100 defendants, including Selahattin Demirtaş, as part of the ‘Kobane case’; is seriously concerned about the continuous political and judicial harassment of Canan Kaftancıoğlu, Istanbul provincial chair of the Republican People’s Party (CHP), who was sentenced on September 2019 to almost 10 years in prison on a politically motivated cases, for which a Supreme Court decision is pending, and who was indicted in December 2020 in a new case for which she faces another 10 years;
12.

Calls for the European Union to take immediate action to ensure that the legality of the arrest and trial of Mr Rusesabagina are investigated and that his rights as an EU citizen are upheld at all stages of this process; calls on the EU Delegation to Rwanda, as well as on the diplomatic representations of the Member States, in particular the Embassy of Belgium in Rwanda, to monitor Mr Rusesabagina’s trial, to visit Mr Rusesabagina in prison, and to raise his case in their exchanges with the Rwandan authorities;
57.

Reaffirms its unwavering support for the ICC and calls on the States Parties to the Rome Statute to provide the ICC with proper financial resources in order to enable it to fulfil its tasks within its mandate; calls for the ICC to continue its work with impartiality and independence; calls for the EU and its Member States to encourage all UN members to ratify and implement the Rome Statute; calls on the signatories of the Rome Statute to cooperate with the ICC; considers the attacks against the ICC to be deeply regrettable and lastly condemns the individual sanctions imposed on its staff, notably those against the ICC chief prosecutor, which are unacceptable; calls on the States Parties to take concrete action to seek the removal of those sanctions and to support those affected by them; stresses that the ICC is the only international institution that has the ability to prosecute some of the world’s most horrific crimes and to defend victims that have no other recourse; recognises the work of the Independent Expert Review, tasked with identifying areas for reform, and calls on the ICC to take all necessary measures to improve its performance, effectiveness and positive impact, particularly on the communities and victims influenced by its work; asks the EU and Member States to continue to protect the ICC’s independence and impartiality against attacks that aim at obstructing the functioning of international criminal justice; calls on the Commission and the EEAS to explore ways and present new tools to contribute to the fight against international crimes, to help the victims of violations of international human rights law and of international humanitarian law to access international justice and obtain remedy and reparation, including through building the capacity of Member States and non-EU countries to apply the principle of universal jurisdiction in their domestic legal systems;
65.

Encourages Albania to diversify energy production, ensure economically and environmentally sound investments in hydropower operations, and increase cost-efficient investments in wind and solar sources; urges the government to minimise the impact on biodiversity by stopping hydropower development in protected areas, in particular in areas near the Valbona and Vjosa rivers, and to establish as soon as possible the Viosa National Park, extending the whole length of the river, in line with its announcement; underlines the need to improve environmental impact assessments, strategic environmental assessments and transparency of procedures across eco-sensitive sectors and to boost the prosecution of environmental crimes; stresses the importance of improving Albania’s strategy on nuclear safety and radiation protection; recalls that Albania is yet to fully align with Council Directive 2013/59/Euratom of 5 December 2013 laying down basic safety standards for protection against the dangers arising from exposure to ionising radiation;
8.

Recalls that Article 18(4)(q) of the RRF Regulation states that national recovery and resilience plans should contain ‘a summary of the consultation process, conducted in accordance with the national legal framework, of local and regional authorities, social partners, civil society organisations, youth organisations and other relevant stakeholders, and how the input of the stakeholders is reflected in the recovery and resilience plan’; calls on the Commission to prompt the Member States to consult all national stakeholders and to ensure the involvement of civil society and local and regional authorities in the implementation of the plans and, in particular, in their monitoring, and to ensure that consultations take place for future amendments or new plans, if any;
14.

Points out that for data controllers that fall within the scope of the US Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), a transfer of personal data from the Union is not possible under these SCCs, due to the high risk of mass surveillance; expects, if no arrangement with the US is swiftly found which guarantees an essentially equivalent and therefore adequate level of protection to that provided by the GDPR and the Charter, that these transfers will be suspended until the situation is resolved; underlines the CJEU finding that neither Section 702 of the FISA, nor Executive Order 12333 (E.O. 12333), read in conjunction with Presidential Policy Directive 28 (PPD-28), correlate to the minimum safeguards resulting under EU law from the principle of proportionality, with the consequence that the surveillance programmes based on those provisions cannot be regarded as limited to what is strictly necessary; stresses the need to address the problems identified by the Court ruling in a sustainable manner in order to provide adequate protection of personal data for data subjects; recalls that no contract between companies can provide protection from indiscriminate access by intelligence authorities to the content of electronic communications, nor can any contract between companies provide sufficient legal remedies against mass surveillance; emphasises that this requires a reform of US surveillance laws and practices with a view to ensuring that access of US security authorities to data transferred from the EU is limited to what is necessary and proportionate, and that European data subjects have access to effective judicial redress before US courts;
23.

Calls for the EU and its Member States to prevent gender-based violence and provide support to victims; reiterates its call for the EU, for all its Member States and for the Member States of the Council of Europe that have not yet done so to ratify and implement the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women (the Istanbul Convention) as soon as possible; calls for the EU to work with Member States and other countries to invest in the collection of quantitative and qualitative data that is of high quality and disaggregated by age, gender, vulnerability status and geography; calls for legislative and policy frameworks to be strengthened in order to prevent, investigate and punish acts of gender-based violence within and outside the family, and to provide support to victims and survivors, including counselling and health, psychosocial and legal services; calls for the provision of training programmes on gender-based violence for members of the judiciary, law enforcement and healthcare professionals, and for health and education systems to be strengthened so as to prevent and respond to gender-based violence from a rights-based, life-course perspective;
(ab)

however, cooperation in certain specific fields should not lead to any concessions regarding values, and the EU should never disregard the geostrategic implications and interests of its partners; indeed, the EU must ensure that any further engagement with the Kremlin will depend on the latter’s promise to end its domestic aggression against its own people, to stop systemic repressions of the opposition and intimidation and torture of political prisoners, to repeal or amend all laws that are incompatible with international standards, such as the ones on ‘foreign agents’ and so-called extremist or undesirable organisations, to stop the repression of civil society organisations, in particular the ones fighting corruption and defending human rights in Russia, and to end its external aggression against neighbouring countries; as part of this, the EU must also remind Russia that detention of political opponents is against its international commitments and insist that the judiciary is de-politicised and the right to a fair trial and access to legal counsel are ensured; in other words, in attempting to engage with the Kremlin, the EU must have clearly defined red lines including full respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of partner countries, and must refrain from pursuing cooperation with Russia only for the sake of maintaining dialogue channels open; the EU should not seek any grand bargain with the Kremlin if the latter seeks a free hand at home and in its declared zone of privileged interests (Ukraine, Belarus, etc.); the EU must make it absolutely clear that it will not sacrifice the interests of other countries for better relations with Moscow;
5.

Notes that cases of misclassification are most prevalent in digital labour platforms that strongly organise, directly or by means of an algorithm, the conditions and remuneration of platform work; calls on the Commission, with the aim of facilitating the correct classification of platform workers, to introduce into its forthcoming proposal a rebuttable presumption of an employment relationship for platform workers, in accordance with national definitions as set out in Member States’ respective legislation or collective agreements, combined with the reversal of the burden of proof and possibly additional measures; stresses, therefore, that whenever platform workers dispute the classification of their employment status in legal proceedings before a court or administrative body according to national legislation and practices, it is for the party who is claimed to be the employer to prove that there is no employment relationship; stresses that the rebuttable presumption of an employment relationship must not lead to an automatic classification of all platform workers as workers; considers that the classification of workers should be based on the facts relating to the actual performance of work and criteria, in accordance with national legislation, and not on the parties’ description of the relationship; stresses that such a rebuttable presumption ensures that workers who are genuinely self-employed are able to remain so and can continue to access work through platforms; further calls on the Commission to clarify that establishing a new EU so-called third status between worker and self-employed person cannot be considered, as it would not help to solve the current problems and risks further blurring already confused concepts, and to ensure that platform workers are either classified as workers or as self-employed persons, in accordance with national law;
24.

Recalls that a high-level panel was established in 2018 to assess cases in the database that are submitted for early detection or exclusion; calls for the opinion of the EDES panel, in the light of its experiences with the system, to be considered in the revision of the Financial Regulation and shared with Parliament at the same time as it is with the Commission; notes that EDES is currently only used under direct and indirect management; considers that economic operators that are considered a risk to EU financial interests under direct and indirect management should also be considered a risk under shared management and vice versa; calls, therefore, for the use of EDES to be made compulsory under shared management; further notes that EDES does not distinguish between subsidiaries of larger corporations; calls on the Commission to make this distinction and to specify in the rules for early detection and for exclusion which entity of a multinational or multi-company corporation is registered for early detection or exclusion; calls for an obligation to update EDES once fraud or other relevant facts have been established by actors involved in the implementation; believes that excluded legal entities or natural persons (beneficial owners) should, for the duration of their exclusion, no longer have the ability to be a final recipient or beneficiary to whom any payments from the EU budget can be made; calls on the Commission to encourage the Member States to ensure that these entities or natural persons are also excluded from any contributions from national budgets for the period of exclusion; regrets that the database lists relatively few economic operators; views this as a sign that EDES has not been properly implemented; highlights that the EDES panel handled 20 cases in 2020, with 28 cases in the pipeline; stresses the importance of allocating sufficient resources to the panel in line with any extension of responsibility; calls on the Commission, moreover, to review the criteria to decrease the complexity and increase the applicability of EDES in practice;
25.

Urges the Commission to present a proposal for a measure to address SLAPP cases such as rules for the early dismissal of SLAPPs and other court actions that have the purpose of preventing public participation, which should include appropriate sanctions such as civil penalties or administrative fines, consideration of abusive motives even if the lawsuit or action is not dismissed, costs and damages suffered by the victim (economic, reputational, psychological or otherwise); stresses that the modalities for applying for an early dismissal should take account of the challenges faced by SLAPP victims, in particular by requiring that the claimant justifies why the action is not abusive, allocating the legal costs of procedures to the claimant and granting legal and financial support to the defendant; strongly encourages Member States to also apply such civil procedure safeguards to domestic SLAPPs cases and not just to cross-border cases; calls on the Commission, further, to address issues giving rise to forum shopping and libel tourism in the forthcoming review of the Brussels I and Rome II Regulations while also taking account of work carried out at The Hague Conference on Private International Law; calls on the Commission, finally, to raise awareness among judges and prosecutors across the Union about SLAPPs, which including the provision of information on the need for early dismissal of such lawsuits, as well as on the proper implementation of the case law of the European Court of Human Rights on defamation;