Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-10-22-Speech-3-121"
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"en.20031022.5.3-121"2
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"Mr President, it has been our lot to live through a historical moment which has proved that Europe would benefit from speaking with a single voice and providing itself with common diplomatic and military tools. Just as Europe managed to provide itself with institutions capable of embodying its collective destiny, the war in Iraq laid bare the immense distance still to be travelled.
The introduction in the draft Constitution of a new figure, the Minister for Foreign Affairs of the European Union, with one, two or three hats, to borrow the colourful language of Mr Berthu, gives us cause for hope. Will this institution do its job? Will it enjoy effective powers? I certainly hope so. We cannot accept that European integration will contain two distinct and separate essences: an economic one which embraces integration, and a political one, in the stark, traditional sense, which clashes with it. This dichotomy does not really exist and has no part in the nature of European integration.
If the question were put to them, the citizens of Europe would come out overwhelmingly in favour of common foreign and security policies. Legislators at European level, then, run no risk of being accused of taking up position in the vanguard, divorced from public opinion, advancing towards European defence and security. The citizens of Europe want to feel secure against the threat of violence, external or internal, but they do not want to be the vassals of any unilateral power, even if it appears in the guise of an ally. They may all dream of Immanuel Kant’s plan for perpetual peace, but they know that the road is hard and that, historically, naïve optimism has a high price."@en1
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