Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-07-06-Speech-3-294"
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"en.20050706.27.3-294"2
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".
Mr President, Commissioner, Mr President-in-Office of the Council, we could actually do with a double allocation of speaking time in order to respond properly to the excellent speeches by those who have spoken to this topic so far, and it is for that reason that I have no option but to speak in summary form.
I think we all agree that the tensions in the Far East have to be taken seriously, whether we are talking about the tension between Japan and China or that between North Korea and Japan. You can take that further, as far as Russia, if you want to include such issues as the four islands that have been occupied ever since the end of the Second World War. It is vitally important that this Europe of ours should make a proper contribution, not merely out of economic considerations, but also with political considerations in mind. After all, we all agree – and I assume that the President-in-Office does too – that we want to promote democracy, human rights and the rule of law, and that we regard our work to these ends as a long-term basis for sound economic relationships.
Commissioner Ferrero-Waldner was right to mention the success of the May summit held between Japan and the EU in Luxembourg, but I sometimes get the feeling that members of the Council and the Commission visit Peking three times as often as they visit Tokyo. It would be no bad thing either for them to visit Taipei; after all, both Taiwan and Japan are countries with multi-party democracies, in which human rights are observed and the rule of law prevails. Neither of those things are yet the case in the People’s Republic of China, and there is only a very distant prospect of either of them being so. If we want to demonstrate the need for democracies to cooperate among themselves, then the numbers of visits and contacts would have to be more evenly balanced.
What I would very much like the Council to tell us now is what position has been reached in the ongoing deliberations on the lifting of the arms embargo. We in this House insist on three things before this can happen. Firstly, we – like you – expect substantial improvements as regards human rights in China. Secondly, the stand-off between Taiwan and China must be brought to an end. With China threatening Taiwan with over 700 rockets stationed on its coast, this is a flash point to the like of which you do not deliver weapons. To the Commissioner, who, I think, was being rather evasive, I would ask whether the Code of Conduct on Arms Exports is now to be legally binding, and if so, when. That, too, is something we regard as a
if there is to be any sort of talk about lifting the arms embargo.
We must do everything in our power to get the countries of Asia to where we are now: the state, sixty years after the end of the Second World War, of having been reconciled with one another. It is for that reason that we should encourage them to press on with the same process of reconciliation, without which there can be no stability and no security."@en1
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