Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-03-12-Speech-3-286"
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"en.20030312.9.3-286"2
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"Mr President, honourable Members, since 1999 the European Union has been applying sanctions against the Taliban regime in Afghanistan. These restrictions were introduced under the common foreign and security policy and in accordance with the relevant resolutions of the UN Security Council.
As the international community believes that terrorism threatens international peace and security, it is vital that the powers of the UN Security Council to react to such threats should be preserved.
Following the terrorist attacks on the USA on 11 September 2001 and the subsequent collapse of the Taliban regime, these measures were reviewed in early 2002. This review led to the lifting of certain restrictions against Afghanistan, such as the flight ban. However, measures against individual members of the former Taliban regime were maintained. At the same time, a great many countries adopted new measures relating to various persons and entities associated with Osama bin Laden and his Al Qaeda network.
These measures were taken by the European Union and other members of the international community in accordance with UN Security Council Resolution 1390(2002). The list of persons and entities whose funds and economic resources are to be frozen was determined by a committee of the UN Security Council on the basis of Chapter VII of the UN Charter on measures necessary to maintain international peace and security. These measures are binding on all UN members.
The Council of the European Union transposed this list into Community law by means of Regulation (EC) 881/2002 and authorised the Commission to publish amendments to this list. As you yourself mentioned, Mr Hernández Mollar, it was in April that Parliament adopted its opinion on this regulation. The Council and the Commission very much welcome Parliament's cooperation in this matter, not only as regards the fight against terrorism and the financing of that fight, but also in terms of strengthening the reputation of Member States as loyal members of the United Nations.
In its opinion of April last year, Parliament quite rightly pointed out that there can be no exceptions in any circumstances to certain rights, the right to life being one of them. The Council considered this and other demands made in Parliament's opinion, taking into account the Member States' obligations under the Charter of the United Nations. On the basis of this consideration the Council reached the conclusion that under the relevant Security Council resolution it was not permissible for the Member States of the European Union to adopt unilateral exemptions to the provisions for freezing funds.
It was therefore necessary to raise this point in the Security Council. Consultations took place with the members of the UN Security Council on the exemptions, which were largely based on humanitarian considerations. During these consultations, some members expressed their concern that exemptions could make the basic arrangements unworkable in practice. This is the background against which the proposal for possible exemptions needs to be viewed. The proposal is in line with Resolution 1452(2002) of the UN Security Council, in accordance with which exemptions are permissible upon application by Member States of the European Union.
The Commission welcomes the report prepared by the Committee on Citizens' Freedoms and Rights, Justice and Home Affairs and wishes to thank the rapporteur very sincerely for his very hard work. The report shows that the exemptions proposed here sufficiently reflect concerns about the possible impact of measures on the right to life of natural persons affected by sanctions.
The Commission welcomes the proposal contained in the report to stipulate exactly what procedures persons and entities on the list should follow if they wish to apply to be deleted from the list of those persons and entities whose funds and economic resources are frozen.
Resolution 1452 and the proposal on which Parliament has given its opinion are important means for promoting respect for fundamental rights. The Commission is conscious that the right balance needs to be struck between the basic rights guaranteed in democratic societies and the need to fight terrorism, a need which has a very high priority on the agenda of the international community."@en1
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