kfajdsl/voxpopuli huggingface dataset:
as minister martonyi has just underlined the hungarian presidency announced earlier its goal to finish negotiations in the first half of two thousand and eleven if all criteria and benchmarks are fulfilled. this is an ambitious goal which can only be achieved if croatia continues to make
this is the essence of its credibility.
the principles of full respect for the conditionality that applies to the candidate countries and full respect for the commitments that the european union has made remain the cornerstones of the enlargement process.
do. indeed i was very pleased to be reassured of the prime minister's personal commitment to ensuring that the work continues at full speed until the european union accession process can be concluded.
meeting targets in the housing care programme for refugees and improving the implementation of minority rights.
i had a very useful and constructive meeting with prime minister kosor yesterday. we discussed the importance of maintaining the momentum of the accession negotiations and of tackling the remaining outstanding issues. the croatian authorities are well
in each of these areas there are clear benchmarks to be met.
i am sure and here i am following the line of minister martonyi that the member states will decide that accession negotiations can be concluded as soon as we can ascertain that the remaining closing benchmarks have been
the commission is currently taking stock of the progress achieved by croatia for each of the benchmarks on which we will report in our upcoming interim report on this chapter due by the middle of march.
aware of what they still need to
the commission will continue to give its full support to croatia which is working hard to achieve its goal of accession to the european union.
as with all negotiations the most difficult issues remain to be tackled in the final phase.
the european union and croatia have provisionally closed twenty eight of the thirty five negotiating chapters. the ministerial accession conference of nineteen april should be able to provisionally close additional chapters where croatia has either fulfilled or is very close to fulfilling the closing benchmarks.
an exceptional effort to fulfil the remaining requirements in time.
croatia has been working hard in both areas but now is the time to go the final mile. as regards the judiciary and fundamental rights the main areas where croatia is called upon to deliver on its commitments are
it has also had to withdraw support from its vital industries and the people who work in them.
of greatest importance all of these changes are being conceded before the consent of the people through a promised referendum has been granted or even asked for.
when enormous changes are carried out in anticipation of a consent that is yet to be obtained we can be assured that consent is seen as a mere formality. the report here says that editors and journalists complain about undue political pressure.
despite opinion poll evidence of majority opposition to eu membership a positive outcome of the referendum is taken for granted.
croatia has had to make extensive and intrusive legislative changes.
media freedom is also under assault. former ministers have been charged with corruption.
mr president we believe that enlargement is one of the more successful aspects of eu policy provided it is carried out according to rigorous criteria and that lessons are learned from previous accessions.
actually it reveals the depth of a malaise that has hardly been addressed.
four five million apparently suffers from nearly a million backlogged court cases with a significant number of cases connected to the abuse of property rights.
widespread corruption among politicians and the judiciary has meant a failure to tackle organised crime directly connected to the balkan route.
some might see this as evidence of action.
according to the council the conclusion of accession negotiations with croatia is within reach but we know from the commission that corruption issues and judicial reform have not yet been properly dealt with.
as we have underlined several times enlargement reinforces peace democracy and stability in europe serves the european union's strategic interests and helps the eu to better achieve its policy objectives in important areas
in the council conclusions on croatia adopted last december we highlighted key issues that require further work in these areas.
it is essential to keep up this momentum in order to conclude the negotiations successfully as underlined among the priorities of the hungarian presidency until the end of june
we would also like to underline some points which are duly reflected in your resolution. the council has noted that encouraging progress has been made by croatia in many areas including the rule of law and the fight against high level corruption.
now that the interagency task force has started to explore important new avenues the council has called on croatia to continue the administrative investigation in order to account for the missing military documents.
the council also encouraged croatia to step up its efforts to fulfil the remaining benchmarks including the building of convincing track records in particular as regards competition policy as well as the judiciary and fundamental rights.
december two thousand and ten which have been endorsed by the european council.
of progress in the field of the judiciary and fundamental rights in march will be very important as regards the possible closing of chapter twenty three later in the semester.
we are therefore very close to the conclusion of the negotiations. however we still have to close a couple of difficult chapters such as competition agriculture and rural development fisheries regional policy and coordination of structural instruments the judiciary and fundamental rights and financial and budgetary provisions
and its capacity to take on the obligations of membership.
let me now speak very briefly about the outstanding issues.
therefore as highlighted in your resolution this semester will be crucial for croatia's negotiating process.
with regard to croatia conclusion of the accession negotiations as stated in the conclusions of the european council is within reach and our goal is to conclude the negotiations by the end of the hungarian presidency
these concern judicial independence and efficiency and the fight against corruption at all levels.
in addition the council welcomed croatia's active role in regional cooperation as well as the improvement in its relations with neighbouring countries and its efforts aimed at reconciliation in the region.
which are key to economic recovery and sustainable growth. enlargement is a key driver for political and economic reform. it moves forward at a pace which is largely determined by the candidate country's respect of the copenhagen criteria
first and foremost i would like to welcome parliament's active engagement with the enlargement process and its constructive contribution to the general debate on enlargement and on croatia's accession process in particular.
provided of course that croatia completes the remaining benchmarks for closing the negotiating chapters.
for our part it goes without saying that we count upon the support and cooperation of all member states of the european commission and of course first and foremost of the european parliament in this endeavour.
i am pleased that slovenia will no longer be blocking croatia's accession over the two countries' border dispute.
the draft european parliament resolution with its balanced message is of vital support for the work undertaken by the commission.
it is important not only for croatia itself but for all the candidate countries and potential candidates. indeed your support will encourage them to keep up the intensity of their efforts on the path towards the european union and closing negotiations successfully.
the progress so far has been impressive but i want to emphasise that this positive momentum should now feed into other areas where much remains to be done.
a robust and independent judicial syste m is absolutely essential in order to fight corruption and to ensure the rule of law in the long term. it is not merely a matter of arresting criminals;
it is about dealing with them afterwards.
otherwise efforts to tackle corruption and organised crime will have no effect.
the second point i want to mention is the need for society in croatia to build on tolerance.
the european project is about reconciliation and this applies not only between countries and i applaud the improved relations with croatia's neighbours but within them as well.
threats of violence against minorities are completely unacceptable.
i firmly believe that all these efforts have been very well demonstrated by this morning's very constructive and very useful debate.
at the same time it will also send an extremely important political message to the other candidate and aspirant countries.
we all know that the key factor of stability cooperation and reconciliation in the western balkans is indeed the european perspective.
good quality enlargement.
this would be an extremely important message for all of us inside and outside the present european union.
in a nutshell safe harbour is meant to be an island of eu style data protection within the us.
must. it will provide legal certainty and protection for data subjects and for companies.
as a result of the lack of transparency and enforcement of safe harbour on the us side some companies do not in practice comply with the scheme.
together we have to apply pressure on the council to accelerate its work so that negotiations can start and an agreement can be concluded in line with the european council conclusions.
eu data subjects must have clarity and must be able to believe that if their data is transferred to the us it is not routinely screened by the nsa.
we also take very seriously the risk that safe harbour as a conduit for transfers of personal data facilitates access by us national security authorities under large scale surveillance programmes.
let me therefore congratulate those in this house who have worked very hard on data protection reform.
scheme based on the implementation of these recommendations.
the us department of commerce and the us federal trade commission with whom i have thoroughly discussed this question should improve the functioning and enforcement of the safe harbour agreement.
it is a responsibility of the commission. it deals with the transfer of personal data from the eu to companies in the us.
there are deficiencies and the commission is addressing those.
it remains essential to speak with one voice to our us partners and to ensure that the protection of data is properly addressed in this us debate.
the exchanges and meetings of the commission with the us authorities the visits of the delegations of this parliament to the us and the work done with the member states in the eu us ad hoc expert group have all been opportunities to highlight our common concerns.
it was also made clear in the united states that we need to rebuild trust in our transatlantic relationship and in transatlantic data transfers a trust which unfortunately has been eroded. as the presidency has already said safe harbour is an important agreement and an arrangement in this context.
exchanges have been very useful and i am looking forward to the important conclusions of the libe inquiry committee.
the aim of this scheme which was put in place in the year two thousand was to make sure that our rights are protected at all times according to eu standards while securing the business advantages which flow from the ability to transfer personal data to the us for processing there.
the national security exemption in safe harbour must work in a clear and narrow way to ensure that it is only used in cases where it is necessary and proportionate according to the fixed standards. our communication on rebuilding trust in eu us data flows makes clear that remedies must be identified by the summer of this year and they should be implemented very soon. we will then review the functioning of the safe harbour
while the safe harbour decision allows limitations of protection when justified by national security they must comply with the principles of proportionality and necessity.
i made it very clear to our american counterparts that this issue needs to be addressed in a satisfactory manner if we want to ensure the continuity of the safe harbour scheme.
a strong legislative framework with clear rules that are enforceable also when data is transferred and processed abroad is more than ever a
this impacts negatively on individuals' rights and may create an unfair competitive advantage for those companies over the european companies operating on the same market.
i am very grateful to the greek presidency for the fact that next week there will be an informal council meeting which will put this subject on the table.
after all the purpose of the safe harbour agreement was to provide eu data subjects with a higher level of protection than that available under the law in the united states in order to meet the eu standards of data protection.
this broader review process should involve an open consultation and a debate in the european parliament.
concrete recommendations in four major areas of improvement which are necessary to be implemented by the us side on transparency on the possibility of effective redress on effective enforcement and on limitations to access by public authorities. with these thirteen points
the commission communication to the parliament and the council on the functioning of safe harbour identifies thirteen crucial points necessary to ensuring the continuity of data protection according to eu standards. the commission made
you can be sure that i will report back to the president of the college and to the college about the discussion which has taken place here today.
i think that the debate which has taken place today in this house will help us to move forward on this one.
on the basis of those conclusions the commission produced thirteen concrete recommendations which relate to all the aspects of the scheme transparency redress enforcement and access for national security purposes.
these thirteen requests are now on the table of the american government.
so those are the thirteen ways to improve the functioning of safe harbour.
it is a to do list and it is up to the american government to recognise the seriousness of our concerns.
the remedies should be identified by summer two thousand and fourteen that is what the commission put on the table. then it will be for the college to look at whether these remedies have been put in place yes or no and then to take a decision.
data collected from eu citizens is being transferred to the us with extremely weak safeguards in place and in the knowledge that the us has lower data protection standards that exist here in the eu.
to allow for the transfer of eu citizens' data and to ensure that we have another mechanism which reflects our higher standard of privacy and data protection in the eu.
mr president following on from that speech i have to say that if there is a symbolic and practical aspect of the parliament inquiry into mass surveillance that is appropriate for this week in strasbourg it must be safe harbour because it affects eu citizens and their data and it affects the commercial and business aspects.
so what are we saying about safe harbour that is so symbolic and practical?
so in these last few seconds i would say to the commission you and we are speaking with one voice to washington but we must treat safe harbour as that symbolic and practical aspect of our inquiry that needs to be fixed with the united states in order to recreate trust with the united states and to ensure that our inquiry has real meaning in rebuilding the regulation of protection as something meaningful between us and the united states.
we have seen in the inquiry clear evidence of non compliant companies continuing to remain on the federal trade commission website as being compliant lack of enforcement procedures from the ftc as well as no adequate complaint mechanisms in place to ensure redress for eu citizens and accountability of companies.
this procedure may lack any real enforceability as it is void of any real obligations on the us to take these seriously.
that has become both a practical factor and a symbol of the problem that we have with eu data transfers and the problem that we have with trust between the european union and the united states and it has become symbolic of what we have to fix.
the idea that you have i think mr weber put it very well a first class and second class standard for citizens or for businesses is unacceptable.
safe harbour as it stands does not offer eu citizens any protection against data access requests by the nsa under the foreign intelligence surveillance act or the patriot act in the us and we have to ask the commission to consider the vast electronic surveillance carried out by the us as a breach of the present wording of safe harbour and limitations for national security.
the report from the review group on intelligence and communication technologies set up by president obama includes a number of recommendations which go some way in this direction.
the commission communication made thirteen recommendations to improve the functioning of the safe harbour.
this means addressing possible differences of understanding between the us and the eu over what is necessary and proportionate in particular for the protection of national security.
or is otherwise processed by companies based in the us.
the disclosure of information about the surveillance programmes operated by the us national security agency the nsa has understandably raised a number of serious concerns.
the eu institutions have responded in various ways to these allegations.
separately an eu us ad hoc working group on data protection has been established to look into the legal framework for us surveillance activities impacting on persons resident in the european union.
the commission also published a communication in november on rebuilding trust in eu us data flows.
while the challenging issue is the nsa surveillance practices the commission's recommendations also address other aspects of the functioning and enforcement of the safe harbour scheme.
the safe harbour decision provides in annex i that adherence to the privacy principle may be limited to the extent necessary if justified by national security public interest or law enforcement requirements.
of data collection.
the council has already expressed strong support for these two points made by the commission.
the third point raised by the commission is the need for greater transparency over the data transferred to a company in the us under the safe harbour agreement.
as a first step the commission has planned an in depth discussion of this report between representatives of the member states within the so called article thirty one committee.
on the other hand we have to take measures to protect the right to privacy and protection of people in the eu. ultimately we can only resolve these matters through dialogue and we therefore welcome all opportunities for discussion.
national governments and their security agencies are vested with preserving the well being of their citizens and we have to bear in mind the fact that the reason why we enjoy this high quality of security in the eu and us is because of these safety mechanisms.
in no way am i saying that basic citizens' rights should be compromised.
in fact these programmes ensure the exact opposite protecting citizens' data privacy.
the way in which the big data business and our intelligence services are invading our privacy and analysing our lives today is outrageous.
but although millions of citizens and consumers publicly complain about this not a single eu government is taking action to stop it.
here in europe they just ignored them. by using the safe harbour decision they evade effective enforcement by european authorities.
we have been insisting on the adoption of a single european data protection law for over two years now.
meanwhile our colleagues in the council of ministers just went around in circles and in lengthy debates without the willingness to determine even their own position on an effective privacy and data protection framework.
and the big data business from silicon valley says thank you while the european unions' citizens and consumers lose their trust in our governments' ability to protect even the most fundamental rights they have.
if we do not stop the circumvention of european rules by us companies by passing our single data protection regulation and putting pressure on the united states and also by cancelling the safe harbour decision we will not only lose the sovereignty of the european union but we will also lose the voters who will stay at home as they do not expect us
because we did not want to make trouble for those companies caught between two conflicting jurisdictions we have tolerated the situation for many years.
we have asked the commission repeatedly for many years to come up with a solution but the commission did not act.
as a matter of fact this famous evaluation of the safe harbour arrangement because it is not actually an agreement came i think two years after the deadline.
so why now give more time to the commission and to the united states to come up with a solution? we know what the problem is.
as far as i am concerned we should suspend the safe harbour agreement today.
maybe that will create the necessary sense of urgency for the commission the us administration and the companies to start working on a serious solution because it is about time this house and the commission stood up for the rights and the protection of individual eu citizens.
the sustained financial and economic crisis is indeed increasing the pressure on national financial resources as member states reduce their budgets.
we want to allow the most affected member states those that have received financial assistance under the european financial stabilisation mechanism or from the balance of payments mechanism to continue to implement their european fisheries programmes on the ground and disburse funds to projects.
but we need to take on board the key criticisms of the auditors before we set about creating the framework for the new european maritime and fisheries fund.
they stated that although the alignment of fishing capacity to fishing opportunities is one of the cornerstones of the cfp and the eff fishing overcapacity has never been defined or quantified. the commissioner said in a recent speech that building up healthy fish stocks in our waters is the best way to increase fishermen's incomes.
we cannot tackle overcapacity if we use taxpayers' money to subsidise the construction of new fishing vessels or the modernisation of existing vessels or indeed as isabella lvin said the upgrading of engines supposedly to make them more fuel efficient and to cut co two emissions but probably to make them more effective at catching fish.
mr ferreira's report seeks to overcome problems with the implementation of the current eff due to spending constraints caused by the economic crisis.
so let us take close cognisance of what the auditors said make sure the emff is used for the best effect in future for funding selective gear for safety on board vessels marketing for pos and for boosting eu aquaculture.
their main complaint was centred on the overcapacity of the eu fleet.
but we cannot hope to build up fish stocks unless we tackle the overcapacity of the eu fleet.
after all fishermen have been plying their trade for centuries without all this and a viable industry has been passed down the generations.
if so eff funding will be a gift to offset a debt.
does that mean that the extra eff money will not be included in bailout repayments?
four five billion to spend on fishing over the period two thousand and seven to two thousand and thirteen covering scrapping of fishing vessels aquaculture inland fishing sustainability and administration of the fund.
does it mean that cash will be available without issuing bonds?