Debate: This is Europe - Debate with the Prime Minister of Greece, Kyriakos Mitsotakis
Date: TUESDAY, 5 JULY 2022
Speaker: Manfred Weber
Political group: PPE
Country: Austria
Language: EN

When you came into office, Greece was in bad shape, I think that was obvious. After painful years of poor leadership by Tsipras, you put Greece back on track – and thank you for this remarkable and excellent work. Thanks to you and thanks to your government, Greece is back in Europe and that is good news.  It is important for Europe to have Greece back. First of all, everybody, I think, should and must underline that Greece is in a way not a normal country because democracy was born in Greece. Our western civilization was born in Greece. Europe was born in Greece, not to mention the princess taken away by Zeus to beautiful Crete, the princess who gave her name to our old joint project, Europa. There is no Europe without Greece.  Greece is back on economic issues. Last year, even in crisis times, the Greek economy grew by more than 8%. When it comes to growth, Greece is among Europe’s top five countries. You managed to reduce unemployment in Greece. In Greece, in the quarter from summer 2019 to February 2022, more than any other country, you did it and the people feel the success in their daily life. Thanks to your efforts and to the determination of the government, Greece is finally also on the way to exiting the surveillance programme.  On another aspect, Greece is back and that is about the security issues. Since you took over, Greece seriously cares about security again. Greece, due to its geographic position, is key when it comes to European security. Europe is not to be criticised but to thank Greece for protecting and defending our common external borders.  And I want to be very clear on this, and I see that each and every single event on the border between Turkey and Greece is in this European Parliament an issue, and it’s okay that we discuss the issues. But on the other hand we saw in Spain, on the Spanish-Moroccan border, an event where more than 20 people died. And I have to tell you that the Socialists and the Greens didn’t initiate a debate about the events in Spain, but they initiate always a debate when it is about Greece. So we should care about the migrants and not about party political issues when it is about migrants.  I have to be clear on this, that the PPE is strongly on the side of our Greek authorities. Erdoğan is misusing migrants as a political weapon like Lukashenko did. For us that’s clear. Our border guards, who are doing everyday the job of protecting people and the border, we trust them, we are respecting their work every day in the interests of all of us. What we have to do is to strengthen Frontex and what we have to do is also to clarify the rules for pushbacks, and I want to thank Margaritis Schinas for his work in this clarification process.  Greece is back also on geopolitical issues. Tsipras, I have to say, mainly cared about Maduro. You care about the European interests in the Mediterranean, and that is good. Not only in the last years do we witness an increasingly destabilising role played by Turkey, dangerously raising the tensions in the region. What Turkey is doing is unacceptable. It is not a problem between Greece and Turkey, but a problem between Europe and Turkey. Greece’s interests are European interests in this border conflict. And we all have to ask ourselves, and probably, Mr Prime Minister, you can reflect a little bit in your final statement, how do we best deal with Erdoğan’s Turkey, a Turkey that is becoming more and more provocative and aggressive?  And Greece is back on foreign and defence issues. Putin and Erdoğan tell us one lesson – Europe must grow up when it comes to foreign and security policy. It is great news that Finland and Sweden have finally joined NATO. And as PPE, our parties in Finland and Sweden always fought for becoming NATO members. The Socialists finally also supported this approach. The PPE is fully supporting NATO, but we also think that Europe has to grow up. We must abolish the unanimous vote principle in the Council side when it comes to foreign affairs, and within NATO we have to build a true common European defence with concrete projects like a cyber-brigade or a European missile defence system. Europeans have to be capable of defending themselves if it is needed.  And if you will allow me, I want to finalise with a more general consideration, because you delivered, Mr Prime Minister, a great speech in the US Congress and in the Senate a few weeks ago. It was a big honour for you to be there as one of the European leaders. And when we look to the US and we also look to our European democracies, we have to see that these democracies are under stress. We are facing populism and extremism, and probably most fundamental question is, can we agree still in our societies about what is true, what is the reality? Because we have fake news discussions – you mentioned this – we have propaganda from China, from Russia, which tried to change what is true, the reality which we are based on. And without the common understanding in our societies about what is true, what is the reality, you cannot build up a lively democratic discussion between Greens, Socialists, the PPE and so on and so forth, and people cannot decide. That’s why the idea to strengthen this common base is so important. The fight against propaganda, too often this is unanswered. We have to strengthen good and serious journalism, and we have to make clear that the tech giants have a responsibility.  We will vote this week on the DMA and the DSA, which would give and will give an answer on these challenges. So thank you, dear Kyriakos, thanks to you Greece is back in Europe. The Greek people can be proud about these achievements.