Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-03-13-Speech-3-056"
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"en.20020313.3.3-056"2
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"Mr President, I agree with much of the President-in-Office's statement, in particular about the need for a strategically positive relationship with the USA. However, I am also particularly grateful to Mr Lagendijk for identifying the key events so clearly. I do not think that it makes any sense to dub the problems in current relations with the USA as ‘cowardice in the face of amity’. I believe that it is urgently necessary, indeed I would even say that it is of the utmost urgency, to discuss transatlantic relations in a very open way. And that is the point, Mr President-in-Office, where there is a difference that has not been mentioned and that you did not touch upon. It seems that at present we do not have the courage to admit to ourselves that the role of the European Union in international relations is undoubtedly at risk because of this. We do not have the courage to admit that there are differences between us and the USA. We do not have the courage to admit that you can hardly say there is a common foreign and security policy at present. There are also significant developments beyond steel which will have serious consequences.
I am certainly pleased that the business community in Europe has at least aired its differences of opinion and not just expressed unreserved support. There is the issue of withdrawal from the ABM Treaty and the issue of unilateral declarations involving clear legal violations. The problem in such cases is that those who have their headphones on hear, whilst those who stand around chatting do not get the message at all.
So the United States has made a unilateral decision concerning the non-proliferation treaty. They are blocking controls on biological weapons. The United States is dismantling the control organisation for the chemical weapons treaty. There has been an announcement about withdrawal from the space weapons treaty. There have been violations of international humanitarian law, the withdrawal from Kyoto, and the non-ratification of the international protocol on the International Criminal Court. I do not want to say that this all adds up to a negative picture, but it is nevertheless clear that there are very big differences between the US and Europe here, and I can only agreed with what Mr Lagendijk has said about nuclear weapons. I am certain that that the plans of the US and probably Russia as well contain even more macabre scenarios, but the point of their becoming public knowledge is evidently to humiliate Russia, which has recently been so zealous in its support for the USA.
I wish to call on the European Union to counter this trend towards genuine multilateralism and the strengthening of the UN, and it should take advantage of its position as a civilian power, a power that practises preventive conflict resolution, and it should actually develop a common foreign policy. The most important condition for this is that, regardless of everything we have in common, we should ensure that these differences are not allowed to be hidden in a kind of European policy blind spot."@en1
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