Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-01-16-Speech-3-219"
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"en.20020116.15.3-219"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I would just like to start by thanking Mr Alyssandrakis for the good work he has done with us. Ever since Lisbon, we in Europe have had the ambitious objective of being the best in the world, and technology and science are of course part of that, although I am not primarily thinking of the electronic voting apparatus we tested yesterday, but of advanced technologies such as, for example, telecommunications, earth observation and ecology. Europe must – as the past demonstrates – concentrate its strengths in these areas. Airbus and Ariane, based in Toulouse, are showpiece projects, demonstrating that Europe, if it concentrates its strengths, is capable of competing on a global scale. Industry is becoming ever more concentrated, and what counts here is the creation of European structures linking the European Union, the ESA and the Member States, which will facilitate more effective cooperation across the board.
Thought should, though, also be given to international cooperation beyond Europe. Here, I am thinking not only of the USA, but also of Russia and China. Any European research policy should of course be of the sort that is also likely to attract the rising generation in this sphere. I am myself from the aerospace industry and have been given to understand that fewer and fewer young people have been studying these subjects in the last few years. We should be tackling that ourselves and not looking to immigration as we do in other areas.
We also need clear objectives in this area, though; hence the urgent request to the Member States to vote clearly in favour of Galileo. Industry, too, should break new ground here. It is important to the future that not only State bodies should take on responsibility, but that industry should also contribute to the development of services that the citizens can use and that are also capable of being marketed.
In conclusion, I would like to deal with an important point that has been mentioned, namely the so-called militarisation of space. I do not think that Europe should be developing a ‘Star Wars’ programme, but I find the idea of equating any military use of the infrastructure with SDI highly dubious. After all, we do not speak of the militarisation of telecommunications just because the German Army uses the telephone. We want a European foreign and security policy, we want a Rapid Reaction Force, we send soldiers to other countries, and these troops must receive the information they need. So we should indeed be thinking at a European level about becoming independent in this area and capable of using our own infrastructure in the future, so that we can do what our responsibility for our own soldiers and our political responsibility in this area require of us. I therefore ask for support for the amendment that Giles Chichester and I have brought in. We really cannot talk here in terms of an SDI; on the contrary, this is a sensible use of the infrastructure in Europe's interests."@en1
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