Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-11-12-Speech-1-121"
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"en.20071112.19.1-121"2
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"Mr President, today I will try to forget that I am a Romanian. I will try to forget, even if people are deported, attacked and killed within the borders of the European Union, simply because they are guilty of being Romanian either ethnically or by citizenship.
Today, I shall try to think as an Italian and as a European. If I were Italian, I would think that I should have the right to feel secure in the country of my ancestors. I would have been outraged by the miserable camps of miserable people around my country’s wonderful towns. I would have been disgusted to see an increasing number of criminals threatening the peaceful life of my compatriots. But, while looking for my security, I would realise that this is consolidated daily by the creative work of more than one million immigrants who are producing Italian goods, offering services in areas left by Italian labour, buying Italian merchandise and paying taxes to the Italian authorities. On the contrary, I would feel that my security would be weakened if those non-Italian residents left my country, if their human rights were violated and if they became the subject of xenophobic practices.
If the basic rights of a single human being are violated by my country’s authorities, who try to hide their weaknesses by intensifying the law behind racist concepts, xenophobic excuses and discriminatory measures, my own rights – and, moreover, everybody’s rights – are in jeopardy.
It is not the first time that security has been set against democratic and humanitarian values, when some believe that fewer human and civil rights mean more security, when insecure people look for refuge within their national community, wrongly thinking that ethnic similarity brings better protection. This is false. An ordinary crime has one or several victims. Racism is also a crime, but it is an extraordinary crime and everybody, including the criminal, is a victim of racism and xenophobia. Racism and racial rule are therefore sources of insecurity.
As a European democrat, I cannot possibly accept that diversity means more insecurity or that some criminals should be socially integrated while others should be excluded. Some have the right to defence and others do not. Some are given the benefit of the doubt and others are not, depending on their national or ethnic origin. As a European, I would not allow one of the Member States – say, Romania – to become a ghetto for the Roma or a European Union Siberia where undesirable European citizens are deported. I can understand that the extreme right is xenophobic, but I cannot understand when the democrats resort to xenophobic and racist speech. I cannot understand the weaknesses and demagogical racist speech of the democrats, and I condemn them more than the extreme right for xenophobia.
For all those reasons, we should now take alarm and mobilise. I hope that the European Parliament motion for a resolution to be adopted on this issue will bring us together in defending European values and the future of Europe."@en1
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