Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-02-12-Speech-3-211"
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"en.20030212.6.3-211"2
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".
Mr President, I must emphasise at the start of this second short statement that the views presented by the Members of the European Parliament here today have been extremely useful to the Council and to me personally as President-in-Office. I imagine that this is what concerns the citizens of Europe. The points made basically reflect what the citizens of Europe expect of us in the old and the new Europe. In the Europe we are all now building together.
I noticed that many of the views highlighted the need for a balance between the measures taken, which of course need to be taken for the security of the citizens in Europe, and the need to protect citizens’ rights and freedoms. The points made by the honourable Members reinforced my own view that greater security must not mean cutting back and compromising on freedoms. Besides, individual freedoms and human rights are elements of our European legal culture. We must not shift the centre of gravity one way or the other, because security is clearly an inalienable right and a primordial right for every citizen; but nor must we shift the centre of gravity and risk cutting back or overlooking and compromising on human rights and freedoms.
I emphasised and I repeat that, during the course of the Greek Presidency, we shall be focusing on striking this necessary balance, which is also why, as I said in my statement, we have included specific issues to do with freedoms, including the freedoms of suspects and defendants, on the agenda for the informal Council. And, by the way, the second item we shall of course be discussing at the informal Council is an issue which directly interests all of us at the moment: the future of Europe and the continuing debate on the future of Europe.
This debate will, I am sure, bring about something we are all hoping for: a stronger role for the European Parliament, so that it can make a more material contribution to the decisions taken.
I was also particularly interested in the honourable Members’ comments that measures must be taken to guard borders at European level. We all want to find a way of protecting, guarding and controlling Europe’s borders, by which I mean the external borders of the European Union. This applies especially to my country, which holds the Presidency for these six months and which has a special significance by reason of its geographical position and the particular configuration of its borders. What I mean is we have a certain amount of experience here. One of the topics being discussed, and which will continue to be discussed, is how to apportion the burden. We need to find a way of apportioning the burden fairly at European level so that we can strengthen our border controls. Obviously, we need to be able to prevent a mass influx of illegal immigrants, because mass illegal immigration makes things worse and creates even more problems within the European Union. It even exacerbates the position of immigrants already in the European Union. However, this does not mean that we should not pay greater attention to the rights of immigrants already in the European Union or that their rights are less important to us. Europe already has decades of experience in admitting immigrants and it is time it did something to speed up its ability to integrate immigrants already in Europe smoothly and more quickly, by which I mean integrate them into the society of the host state.
I shall close with a brief reply to a question about whether there is a risk of a mass influx of refugees in the wake of possible events in Iraq. There is, I think, a daily risk of a mass influx of refugees from countries outside the European Union and this is being discussed in the relevant committees. I think that we need Community financial support and we need to spread the burden fairly, irrespective of what happens in Iraq. Of course we all hope that developments will not result in situations which give rise to another mass influx of refugees arriving in the European Union. In other words, we hope to maintain peace and not to have to face awkward situations which, as we all know, apart from any other adverse repercussions, give rise to waves of immigrants."@en1
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