Speeches

Madam President, thank you very much. The far right's dream of a Europe surrounded by walls with barbed wire fences is becoming a reality. The hundreds of millions of euros spent on preventing people from entering the EU will not put an end to poverty, wars and natural disasters. Everyone who thinks about it knows that. All EU prime ministers and governments know this. They also know that it will instead make people more desperate and take greater risks. The winners are the security and defence industry. The losers are people fleeing for their lives. Walls and fences do not solve the big problems. We need to be able to do better than this. We can do better than this.

Madam President, thank you very much. For some of us in here, the threats from right-wing extremists have persecuted us since we were young children. They have characterized us, built us, and throughout life reminded us that just because you look like you do, there are people who hate you so much that they are prepared to resort to violence. We also know that behind the extremists there are right-wing populists who, with words of contempt and hatred, not only sanction but activate the violence. These right-wing populists are here in the European Parliament and they are in the Swedish Parliament. If we want to put an end to the threats, hatred and violence from right-wing extremists, then we must also put an end to right-wing populists.

Madam President, thank you very much. Sweden – the new EU presidency – is led by a puppet government that carries out, in many areas, the policies of the far right. The Swedish Presidency thus puts its finger on the question: Is it beautiful ideals or our actual actions that define us as union? I ask because Pandora's box is wide open. In Sweden, it was the Prime Minister who opened it when he invited the far-right to the table, and it was the Liberals who gave him the key. Sweden's prime minister is not stupid and not fooled. He knows what he's doing. He thinks it's worth it. Right-wing extremism is something that comes to the fore in order to gain power. And unfortunately, he's not alone. The extreme right-wing wave we see in the EU is often made possible by conservatives and liberals. Hédi Fried survived the Holocaust. She reminded me and many others that grains of sand are added to grains of sand. And before you know it, there's a whole pile of sand in front of you. What was unthinkable just a few years ago is now the new normal. Without being embarrassed, say one thing and then do another. To speak beautifully and widely about the green transition and the rule of law, but let climate deniers, with Viktor Orbán as the model, hold the reins. We must be many who dare to continue to point out the grains of sand, who refuse to accept that human rights do not extend to all but only to some, and who protest when unscientific decisions are taken in the midst of a burning climate emergency. Future generations will judge us harshly and divide us into those who made it possible and those who resisted.

Madam President, 30 years ago, we agreed that minorities’ rights need enhanced protection and promotion, and in only a few weeks’ time, Sweden will take over the presidency of the Council, a country with a government that is in practice run by a party established by Nazis in the late 80s. The European Union has committed to protecting and promoting minorities’ rights, but for the next six months the work of the Council will be led by a country – my country – which in area after area is doing the opposite of just that. I refuse to accept and pretend that the EU stands up for values that we do not implement in reality. In a democracy, the majority has a responsibility to promote and defend minorities’ rights. Why are you so many that choose to shy away from that fundamental responsibility?

Mr President, thank you very much. The EU should be a sanctuary. A community where all of us who live here should be able to express our opinions, engage, be vocal in our protests and powerful in demonstrations, without registration of opinions or other sanctions. That is not the case today. Not for everyone. We know that foreign agents are persecuting EU citizens here in the EU. A fact and an oppression that, among other things, the Iranian diaspora has lived with for decades. The Islamist regime in Iran not only wants to intimidate the people of Iran into silence and obedience, but is also persecuting our citizens here. The EU must put an end to Iran's agents. They will be tried, they will be sentenced and they will be expelled. No one is free until everyone is free.

Mr President. Why? Why are you discussing how to criminalise people and organizations that save lives; instead of putting the pressure on the EU governments that shy away from their responsibilities? And how dare so many of you define yourself as Christians and repeat that you are defending Christian values when your ideas and your actions are proof of the opposite. There is no doubt about responsibility when it comes to saving lives at risk at sea. Thank God for the ones that do what needs to be done. We need to discuss how we shall do what they are doing.

Madam President, police opening fire at civilians, children being killed, girls being raped in prisons by security guards to make sure that they are not virgins and, therefore, will not go to heaven when they die. Thousands upon thousands imprisoned and at risk of state-sanctioned executions. For many, it is already too late. But it does not mean that it was all for nothing. If we want to be on the right side of history, we have no choice but to continue and to do more, much more. All other alternatives would mean that we let the murderous Islamic regime continue to dictate the terms. So we have a choice: be silent or act in solidarity with the extraordinarily brave Iranian people who, day after day with their own life at stake, continue to fight for their freedom. Woman, life, freedom.

Madam President, Commissioner, some things seem so self-evident, so obviously the right thing to do that we tend to believe that they will eventually just happen, that the persons with the most and the best qualifications take the seat in the room is one of those things. There are those who want to reduce the long battle to make sure women have a seat at the decision-making tables of companies to only be about fairness, when it is equally as much about competence. During the course of working with this legislation, we have again and again been told that it is a person’s qualifications and skills which should determine if they get a certain position, and that is exactly how it should be. After many years of hard work, we hopefully are a majority who can agree that the competences we need in companies in the EU are not only those of white middle-aged men. Experiences and knowledge comes in other shapes and colours that we need to make our companies, our Union, the best it can be. Women on boards should be the self-evident first step to take, but it is only the beginning of something that can become even bigger.

Mr President, thank you very much. Racism and discrimination are a reality that characterises people’s entire lives – their upbringing, their schooling, their opportunities and their daily lives. Racism does not only affect individuals. It affects all of us, whole societies and whole countries. Racism stands in the way of development. There are those who live and act in the belief that racism is not a problem. They're wrong. It shows all the research and all our history. Allowing racist ideas to have an influence in a country's politics, as happens in the EU, including in Sweden, is stupid. It's a short-term, expensive profit for a few. Racism is destructive. It's destroying. That is why we will continue to fight it, everywhere and all the time.

Mr President, thank you very much. Ideas are like energy. They don't disappear, they are transformed. Our responsibility is to understand which ideas provide the conditions for life and community, and which ideas create divisions, which build suspicions between people, which turn into hatred, which slowly but surely destroys. The nationalist ideas that were given space and emerged at the beginning of the 20th century, and that ended in the Holocaust, still exist. In today's Europe, they are carried by the far-right. But just as then, they are helped today, above all, by conservative and liberal politicians, who, blinded by their own gain, believe that they can tame monsters. Right-wing populism seduces easy-footed politicians. We see it in Italy, we see it in Hungary, in Croatia and sadly also in Sweden – the country that will soon take over the EU presidency. In order not to be forced to repeat our history, we must know it. We must understand how one leads to the other, and we who want to be on the right side of history must dare to make uncomfortable decisions. We have to dare to defend what we know gives our children a future to look forward to, and we have to put hard on hard against all steps in the opposite direction. And it has to be done now. It should have been done just now. We don't have a second to lose.

Mr President, thank you very much. It started with Jina Masha Amini, but the detainees, the injured, the murdered have many more faces and as many names. The perpetrators, murderers and accomplices – there are also many. But we know who they are and what they should be held accountable for. Then there's the rest of us, who are on the sidelines. We who can choose to live our lives as usual or do what we can with what we have. Peace and freedom do not come for free. The brave women, men and children who have taken to the streets all over Iran with their lives, they show how expensive freedom is. The reactions and perseverance of the outside world will determine whether their struggle, whether their death, was in vain or not. The freedom movement in Iran needs all the support it can get, while at the same time making it inconvenient for the Iranian assassination regime. (The speaker uses a non-official language).

Madam President, thank you very much. There are things in the world around us that we can say we didn't know or that we knew very little about. The situation of many Roma in the EU is not one of those things. For decades, we in power have received a report after a report describing in black and white all the grey scales of misery – from systematic discrimination in housing queues and the labour market to illiteracy, begging and sex trafficking of children – in the EU in 2022. Claiming that racism and discrimination against Roma in the EU is normalised is a understatement. Everyone knows, no one does enough. I hope that this report will be the exception that confirms the rule. Let it make a difference.

Mr President, thank you very much. Colleagues and visitors! This year we had to fight to find out the truth about the state of fundamental rights in our Union. The truth about the rise of racism. The Truth about Discrimination. The truth about the threats against journalists and investigative media. We had to fight the far right in this Parliament in order to be able to write down the facts at all. They wanted to make the facts invisible. They wanted to make invisible what affects people in Europe every day. But they lost, as racists, fascists and Nazis and their fellow runners always do in the end. No matter where they are, whether it is in the Swedish parliament and government or if it is in the European Parliament, they will lose in the end. But the path to their loss is a terrible journey. Those who pay the highest price are the ones who need the rights the most. I am so grateful and happy that we are still more human rights defenders in this Parliament. So far, the truth is on the table.

Madam President, thank you very much. united in diversity. That is the motto of the European Union. Those of us who sit here, however, do not reflect the diversity that exists among the citizens of the European Union. This is partly because not everyone has the same opportunities to take their place and raise their voice. Many are discriminated against, and we know that discrimination is intersectional. Several different grounds of discrimination interact and limit people's opportunities to take their place and raise their voice. The report on which we are about to vote is a step in the right direction. With this report, we recognise intersectional discrimination. We are saying that we should do more to combat it, and we are putting forward a series of tools on how to do this. I would like to thank you for your cooperation with everyone from right to left. The cooperation and the constructive atmosphere has given me hope.

Madam President, thank you very much. We live in a reality where many women do not decide for themselves whether they want to have sex or not and therefore cannot decide for themselves whether they want to get pregnant. In addition, there are many reasons why you want to interrupt a pregnancy. Whatever the reasons behind the desire to have an abortion, it is often a difficult decision – sometimes the most difficult decision in a woman’s life. At the same time, there is a dispute over whether it is the individual who should decide or whether it is the state that should decide that you should be pregnant, no matter what you want. Those of us who are prepared to defend our freedoms must put an end to value-conservative development. A concrete first step to do so is to ensure that abortion rights become part of the EU's fundamental rights.

Madam President, thank you very much. Firstly, we must be convinced that it is a fundamental right to decide when, where, how and if you want to become pregnant. Secondly, we must understand and act on the fact that the rights and opportunities that generations of women before us have fought for for decades are under threat. Abortion resistance is growing. Third, we scientifically know how to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies. This is done scientifically through early education and teaching about sex and cohabitation. It is done through a generous supply of contraception and it is done through the right to legal abortions. The U.S. Supreme Court's decision to tear up the law that gave American women protection and the right to make decisions about their own bodies will have far-reaching consequences far beyond America. This will also affect the EU. In Poland, amazing, brave Poles are fighting for women's right to make decisions about their own bodies. The fact that several women have died because doctors have not dared to give them the help they needed is unacceptable. We must act much more forcefully than we have done so far.

Madam President, thank you very much. Are all EU citizens equally valuable? If the answer is yes, then why do we allow millions of Poles not to have the same rights, freedoms and opportunities as the rest of us? Polish activists fighting for fundamental human rights risk being accused, prosecuted and brought to justice because of the Polish judicial system, which even the European Court of Justice is calling for to be reformed. Those who pay the highest price for our inability to do the right thing are Poles fighting for what Europe should be – free, equal, fair. It is a disgrace to the European Union and, in particular, to the Commission, which, by approving the plans of the Polish Government, paves the way for an authoritarian Poland, a mini-Russia in which the state oppresses its own citizens with our common tax money.

Mr President, thank you very much. Those who have tortured, injured and killed civilians in Ukraine must be brought to justice and severely punished. Sexual violence and rape are crimes that have been committed and are still being committed in Ukraine. It is used, as we know, to threaten, humiliate, humiliate and harm, and we know that it is mainly girls and women who are the victims. At the same time, we know that sexual violence and rape are war crimes that in practice rarely lead to legal aftermath and punishment. We need to change this. We must ensure that the words behind which we now form a majority also become deeds.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, dear Terry, You have managed to rally Parliament behind the important and big thing that we should not accept that the situation of the rule of law in the EU continues to erode. Instead, with this report, you and we are demanding that we do more, that the Commission do more. For it is with sadness that we note that behind the two countries that are leading the way in not accepting the principles of the rule of law are the majority of other Member States with similar tendencies. Countries that step by step in the shadow of Poland and Hungary are curtailing the freedoms that we know are essential for strong and sustainable democracies: media freedom, minority rights and civil society opportunities. We must demand, out of respect for the people who have elected us and out of respect for the institutions on which we carry out our mission, that the Commission take firm action against all Member States that violate the principles of the rule of law.

What our fellow Member is expressing is racism, and the fact that we are sitting here and accepting that this is being expressed in our House, in our Parliament, in Europe is shameful. I hope that there are many of us who protest against this and do not normalize what is going on now. Everyone heard what she said. Act, do something!

Mr President, thank you very much. We have tools and there is money, but it is obviously sad that there are far too many people in power who do not want to change the fact that Roma in the EU live more than others in poverty, live without electricity, water and sewage, do not go to school, do not have work, have major health problems and in many countries are not even registered as citizens even though they have lived in the country for generations. There are probably thousands or more children, Roma children, who are not on paper. If there is one thing we should be ashamed of, it is that this is happening in the world's richest region, and if there is one thing we should do, it is to change this unworthy reality.

Madam President, thank you very much. Commissioner, thank you very much. Dear colleagues, We know that in Afghanistan, girls are being stopped from going to school. We know that women are prevented from working, and we know that they are also not allowed to travel without the company of male relatives. All this while more than 24 million Afghans are dependent on emergency humanitarian assistance, and 97% of the population is at risk of falling into poverty. 97%! We are witnessing an upcoming humanitarian catastrophe in Afghanistan, and we in the EU, the richest region in the world, cannot and must not look away and blame ourselves for being distracted by other atrocities. We are the ones on this earth who have the best, most and most opportunities to make a difference. Humanitarian aid to Afghanistan must be scaled up and we must continue to work for and provide protection to those who fight for their rights no matter where they come from, no matter what colour they are.

Mr President, thank you very much. Commissioners! Colleagues! I just got back from Ukraine and Poland. Together with Polish volunteers, I visited an area northwest of Lviv, around the small town of Javoriv. Ukraine's future is on the run. In the surrounding villages, the population has increased, doubled, tripled, by the people – including many children – who are now displaced in their own country. Putin's bombs have forced millions of children to flee their homes. Those who should sit safely in the school bench or play in kindergarten are instead in uncertainty. Teenage rooms have been replaced with tent beds in transit accommodations, playgrounds for train stations. At the Medyka border crossing between Poland and Ukraine, I witnessed the first meeting of many children and young people with the EU. Thanks to amazing volunteers, most were received with warmth, a blanket, some food and chocolate. At the same time, neither the Polish authorities nor the EU's own resources were in place, and anyone could easily reach the tired and vulnerable people who arrived. At another border post, children had frozen to death and died of dehydration in their mothers' arms. The Polish volunteers talked about trafficking gangs that have systems in place to catch women even before they left Ukraine and then abduct them once they have crossed the border into Poland. I got testimonies of mothers who had to pay for the flight across the border with sex. No woman should be exposed to this and no child should have to experience this. The EU must eradicate the purchase of sex by men! Men's purchases of women and children! How sick is this? How sick are there in the EU? Who kidnaps children? Who has sex with children? Who buys and exploits a woman on the run who has lost everything? It does men who have a place in hell. The EU has enormous resources and, with them, huge responsibilities. But after the days in Ukraine and Poland, I am afraid that our big words about how terrible it is do not turn into action. I dream nightmares that we knew, that we heard and that we saw, but that we didn't do everything we could.

Madam President, thank you very much. The textile sector has a major impact on the climate, the environment and human rights. This is precisely why we need rules and guidelines on how to reduce all the negative impact that is currently a fact. We have tried to influence the Commission to present a holistic approach, which is also what industry players demand. We have done everything we can to ensure that you make binding proposals, not keep the door open to arbitrariness. We have presented figures and facts about discrimination and human rights violations that exist in industry and from which we could take steps. My questions to the Commissioner responsible are as follows: Will the strategy include a binding climate target that includes all emissions from our consumption? Will the strategy take into account the fact that we need to drastically reduce our consumption and production of textiles? How? Are you setting goals for this? How will you ensure gender mainstreaming at all stages of the value chain?

Mr President, thank you very much. People are running for their lives, families are splitting up, children are being killed, live, just a few hours away. whereas reality has shown that the EU’s slippery asylum and migration policies, focusing on closed borders, returns and cooperation with states that do not respect democratic rules of the game, are not sufficient; This policy has played its part. It's not what people fleeing for their lives need. The Temporary Protection Directive is therefore very welcome. But more is needed. The EU is the most free and prosperous region in the world. We have a duty and a responsibility to practice solidarity with the people of Ukraine. We must also provide protection to those fleeing war and terror, regardless of nationality, regardless of background. We must never normalize and never accept racism.