Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-01-17-Speech-3-167"
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"en.20010117.5.3-167"2
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"Mr President, I would like to congratulate the President-in-Office and the Commissioner for their remarks. In particular for what they have had to say about the death penalty and the situation in China and Iran.
I only regret that the word Russia was not mentioned by either gentleman because it occurs to me that the situation in Russia is worrying. This needs to be considered by the Commission in particular if we are to look towards a satisfactory human rights situation in Europe as a whole. With any luck the timing will be good and Mr Patten will be able to raise certain questions with the Russian President.
It is very timely that this matter should come up because it is nearly ten years since the collapse of the Soviet Union. At that time we had very high hopes that the whole of Europe would become a human rights-favourable zone but of course things never turn out exactly as one hopes. The situation in particular in Byelorussia has deteriorated dramatically and there have been the most horrible civil wars and massacres on a massive scale in the Balkans.
We must congratulate ourselves in Europe on some progress but not enough has been achieved. I am particularly happy to see what has occurred in Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic. The human rights situation in those countries has improved dramatically and in the Baltic States with the build-up of the mixed economic system. Some people do not consider that to be a human right, but I believe in fact that it is and represents another step forward that we should welcome.
It moves me very deeply every summer to see in the resorts of the Mediterranean and elsewhere large numbers of holidaymakers from eastern and central Europe including Russia holidaying in the way that we have done for many decades. It is, as a British Foreign Secretary, Ernest Bevin, used to say, the main purpose of a foreign policy to allow citizens to be able to travel with a minimum of bureaucratic interference and annoyance.
I believe though that I should mention two or three of the particular problems of Russia. One of them is one in which I have a registered interest, namely the question of Media-Most, and the alternative television system of Russia. I hope that Mr Patten is well briefed on the question of the present detention of the chairman of Media-Most, Mr Vladimir Gusinsky. He is rather surprisingly in his house near Malaga in Spain. I find it bizarre that the Spanish police are fulfilling a request made by the former KGB in this way.
The war on dissent continues on the part of Mr Putin. He seems not to have a sense of humour. He does not like to see himself portrayed on the television by a glove puppet with jokes being made at his expense. It seems that it is not appropriate for the President of Russia to be lampooned in this way and so he will not tolerate it. It is a most unpleasant feud made all the more unpleasant by the fact that one side is enjoying the support of the President of Russia. This is not satisfactory and I hope it will be dealt with during Mr Patten's visit.
Very briefly, the other points I would mention in respect of Russia are the situation in the Russian army, in particular in Chechnya, but also internally because the Russian army is notorious these days for the cruelty which it exerts and in particular the treatment of its young conscript soldiers. I have also watched with concern in the past year the tendency of the present leaders of Russia – many of whom are ex-KGB because they were appointed by a former colonel in the KGB – to be a little bit trigger-happy in the arrest of so-called British, American and Russian spies. This is really something that is quite unnecessary I would have thought in the post cold-war environment.
So, with those reservations I congratulate the Commission and the President-in-Office and look forward to an improvement in human rights in the coming year."@en1
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