Speeches

Mr President, the Hungarian Government has taken a new step on the path towards a Putin-style future. Yet another Russian-inspired law has been promulgated, this time under the guise of protecting national sovereignty. Anything that could be considered as likely to violate or jeopardise the sovereignty of Hungary is now considered to be a crime, and can be punished under criminal law. Of course, the notion of sovereignty is immensely broad and vague, potentially making almost everyone is suspect in Hungary. It means that criticising the government in Hungary will now be dangerous, as it will officially make you, in legal terms, a traitor. Once again, civil society activists, journalists and political opponents are under threat and the president of the so-called Sovereignty Protection Office has already officially spoken of broadening the scope of this law, as well as the targets. What is the real state of democracy in Hungary? How can the next European, national and local elections be held safely in Hungary under these conditions?

Madam President, this resolution had been foreseen by those working on the topic to have a last resolution on the situation in Hungary, and the Article 7 procedure coming from this Parliament, before the end of our work. It is even more important today because developments in Hungary have provoked the creation of a new law – so-called ‘the sovereignty law’ – inspired by Russian, similar laws, of course. This new law will be further criminalisation not only of activists and journalists, but of many citizens – and just for you to have an idea, the president of this new institution working on sovereignty made an interview and some of his words were a threat directly to some of us. Tomorrow, those Hungarian MEPs in this room that publicly advocated for conditionality of funds in their own country will be considered unloyal to the sovereignty of their country, and they could be punished even for jail. Not only that, but we need a last legacy from this Parliament after five years of very hard work. It is expected by Council, most of our Perm Representation and the Commission. And just to finish, I want to recall to everyone that at the end of our term, presidency will be held by Hungary and we need to have a very clear statement coming from this Parliament in these conditions.

Mr President, it is time for feminists, for progressives and for citizens to ask for what is needed. And in 2024, enshrining sexual and reproductive rights in the heart of our European text is a necessity for the well-being of people and specifically the safety of women. There is no healthy democracy without women’s rights and gender equality. Last November, this Parliament voted to have the inclusion of these rights in the Charter of Fundamental Rights, and it is good to reaffirm it today. But why be less ambitious? We have to reclaim the entirety of our rights and to counter the narrative of the far right and those who want to make us live in fear. Bodily autonomy comes with contraception. Bodily autonomy comes with sexual education. The health of women can no longer be less of a priority for academics and doctors. Ignorance has always been a poison used to control a population. Of course we need abortion. Abortion gives women the power to choose their own lives. This is not a discussion. There are still too many women at risk of dying, or having to flee their country to find a solution, or seeing their life dramatically impacted by an unwanted pregnancy in the European Union. Yes! But this is a societal and democratic issue, not a woman’s problem. All people, no matter what their sex and gender, should know their body. So this is how to protect it. How to heal it. The nature of desire. What is consent? This is what we need. We need full and universal access to sexual and reproductive health and rights without discrimination, including, indeed, access to safe and legal abortion.

– Mr President, civil societies should be legitimised and supported, not criminalised. This important and very good report is an essential and much needed step towards protecting civil society in the European Union, and a breakthrough for all of those who continuously fight for democracy across European borders. The work of civil society has a huge impact on what we do as MEPs in this Parliament, and it is indispensable for the work of the Commission and the Council, but institutions do not sufficiently valorise the pro bono advisory work that civil society organisations do for their reports, for the quality of legislation and for citizens. We also need to involve civil society in decision—making processes and, most regrettably, the EU barely takes a stand when they are attacked in some Member States. In order to reinforce civil society, we need to give them a European legal form and EU—wide protection.

Mr President, broadening is a strategy for investing in peace, democracy, the rule of law and security. The war launched by Russia against Ukraine has reminded European countries of the importance of continuing to enlarge the European Union and strengthen this area of values and humanism. In particular, we had neglected too much the relationship with the Balkan countries, which have been waiting for so long. But clear roadmaps are needed for each candidate country. Current accession procedures have shown their shortcomings. We have not been able to support civil society and the people of these regions who are fighting for democracy and a European future. Too often, both the Commission and the states have prioritised geopolitical or trade interests in the Balkans, and the integration process has not sufficiently taken into account reform capacities as well as democratic progress or setbacks. Each candidate country must be assessed honestly and in dialogue not only with leaders, but also with citizens. We must think of gradual integration, but above all, we must have a Commissioner who is up to the task for the next term. When fundamental freedoms were attacked in Serbia, this was ignored. When European funds distributed in this region were filled the pockets of a ruling elite, this was not sufficiently controlled. We need better monitoring of the use of money, a reinforced evaluation by the Commission, and perhaps we need to go as far as introducing conditionality for accession countries as well.

Mr President, rights and freedoms have finally become a regular and formalised topic of conversation in the European Union. It was not until a government methodically dismantled the rule of law. Yet, despite this precedent in Hungary, a similar process is taking place today in Greece, without sufficient reactions: Weakening of independent authorities, terrifying climate for journalists, suspicion of corruption of state leaders and services, harassed prosecutors, criminalised civil society services, fundamental rights under attack. In Slovakia there are plans to restructure public media and purge institutions as a first step towards capturing power. But there is another country, quoted too often in this report, which should attract our vigilance: France. Mentioned for the abuse of its security forces, for the detention of journalists, for the attack on associative freedoms. Successive counter-terrorism measures and restrictions on civil liberties have significantly undermined the rule of law in France for more than a decade. If an autocrat came to power, the repressive arsenal would be in place. But without even a change of president, we can now wonder if democracy in France is already declining.

Mr President, the Greens and the Pirates, contrary to most of you, are very concerned about the Prüm II Regulation. Civil society organisations have pointed out the insufficient safeguards. Prüm I failed to demonstrate its necessity and proportionality, and Prüm II will now expand data categories and optimise exchanges of information. It will bring in a centralised router enabling the automated exchange of facial images and police records. It will increase the exchange of personal data among police authorities, and it will allow for searches into police databases containing personal data before even any crime has been committed, for so-called crime prevention. Searching for those convicted of crimes, indeed, but also for suspects and in certain cases, victims. We are already seeing what happens when the power of law enforcement goes unchecked. In France, people are arrested for nothing more than attending a protest, and they will then enter this famous database. At the EU borders, experiments with invasive biometric surveillance technologies against vulnerable migrant populations, and this list goes on. And will this regulation stand up at the European Court of Justice in terms of the processing of biometric data? The lack of safeguards and the expansion of facial recognition jeopardise our privacy and our data protection. With Prüm II not only do we increase police powers across Europe and reduce the control we have over our own data, but we also decrease the level of scrutiny citizens have over law enforcement and of creeping police surveillance. This is a real concern.

Madam President, our democracy seems really fragile in Europe these days. While EU institutions look elsewhere, the situation in Greece is quickly deteriorating. We talk a lot about Hungary because things have gone so far there that it’s now a quasi-autocracy. Have we learned nothing? The Greek Government is fostering an increasingly restrictive legislative environment, which surveils and criminalises civil society, refugees and journalists. The same recipe used in Hungary and other Member State governments with autocratic tendencies. For the second year in a row, Greece came last among EU countries in the Reporters Without Borders 2023 index. There has been no justice for the murder of Greek reporter Giorgos Karaivaz, cases of harassment and intimidation against journalists in Greece are well documented, and there is a climate of fear in which journalists, independent bodies and civil society operate. The wiretapping of journalists, the attempted hacking of opposition politicians and the export of spyware remain unsolved. Refugees are tracked and monitored through the use of behavioural analysis algorithms and biometric surveillance. Individual human rights defenders are vilified in the media, subjected to smear campaigns and death threats. Those investigating corruption, be they journalists or prosecutors, are the victims of abusive trials and constantly risk charges being brought against them. Are we going to let the authorities in Greece continue to crackdown on fundamental rights?

Mr President, European democracy may be dying. This is not an overdramatic sentence that I’m using to get your attention: it is exactly what is happening because of the resistible rise of one man – the Prime Minister of Hungary. Not only has he created a quasi-autocracy on the soil of the European Union, not only has he eroded civil liberties and now fundamental rights for his own people and set a frightening example, not only has he put a foot in the middle of the system and become the voice of the Kremlin around the table, but over the last few years he has been playing you: blackmailing every Member State more and more, and in a systematic way. The EU has made this politician stronger. The Commission gave him the money to capture power and install his oligarchy, and the Council empowered him by accepting to give him leverage and set the rules. At the end of your presidency, Belgians, you will be giving this man the keys of the House. This will pave the way for him to set the agenda, say whatever he wants about Russia and Ukraine and represent the EU in our name. It is inconceivable. But the leaders of Europe have decided to not do anything about it. It is time to take the game out of his hands. Belgian Presidency, you need to put back the recommendations on the table. You have already started working on this. You can find the needed qualified majority. How is it possible that today we are still not having enough Member States around the table who are courageous enough to vote on a simple recommendation? You need to prepare for the future, and that means Article 7.2. It is time to seriously think about withdrawing the voting rights of Viktor Orbán. But most of all, today, you urgently need to find a way to not give the presidency of the EU to a quasi-autocrat. (The speaker declined to take a blue-card question from Edina Tóth)

One year after the "Qatargate", what exists to prevent corruption in the European institutions? To the Council? Nothing. To the Commission? Nothing. A code of conduct is not an anti-corruption tool. The independent ethics body that was devised to supervise, investigate and punish corruption cases is a project that has so far disappeared. In Parliament, we have made great progress on transparency issues, in particular with the declaration of assets. But parliamentarians will continue to judge each other, and MPs risk protecting each other, as they often do. It has been impossible to create a structure with independent experts to study cases of conflicts of interest in this house, and little more possible to discuss the €5,000 we receive each month as overheads in addition to the budgets we already have. Finally, it seems that it remains normal in the ambient culture to accept lunches, trips abroad, places for football matches. Yet every time a public policy decision is made, here or elsewhere, under the influence of private selfishness, it is democracy that is damaged, it is the public interest that is lost, it is our common public money that is diverted. A healthy democracy is a democracy without complacency towards corruption, be it large or small, be it spectacular or everyday.

Madam President, in a failing European democracy, with tragic backsliding of rule of law in Hungary and authoritarian threats coming from inside and outside, the defence of democracy is a hugely important topic, one that requires a carefully considered proposal in the light of all the challenges: malicious interference in our electoral processes; disinformation from Chinese, Russian, and other actors; the use of spyware against opposition candidates; the increasing criminalisation of civil society by politicians; and the numerous attacks against journalists. Like others in this House, I have spent this mandate fighting to protect democracy and fundamental rights with the help of civil society throughout. Civil society is instrumental in safeguarding EU values, so we need to address the lack of transparency requirements for interest representatives, but without endangering the work of NGOs. The foreign agents aspect in this package risks so much to sabotage the work of civil society. It could even play into the hands of those who are already looking to target civil society at any cost, instead of addressing the real democratic flaws.

Mr President, issues related to the digitalisation of justice look merely technical at first sight, but they are highly political. I know we all agree this is about ensuring more efficient justice systems and a better access to justice for everyone. But as the European Commission, the Council, and a majority of this European Parliament actively promote this digitalisation at all costs, we should not forget it can also have harmful impact on the fairness of criminal proceedings, as well as the rights guaranteed to suspects and accused persons. First of all, digital tools should be an exception and not the norm. Using videoconference during a trial will never be equivalent with being physically present. Then also, not everyone has equal access to digitalisation. When implementing these two new pieces of legislation, Member States need to ensure people with learning difficulties, physical disability, children, and those who haven’t learned to use technologies can still enjoy their right to access justice.

Mr President, once again, thanks to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, we are made aware of a huge money laundering scandal in the EU. The latest investigation shows how financial firms in Cyprus have aided Russian oligarchs in hiding their wealth offshore. So it seems that Cyprus has widely contributed to Russian influence through its golden passports and visa schemes. Dozens of Russian billionaires were clients of the island’s professional service providers. Some have come under sanctions since February 2022 and others since 2014. 800 companies registered in tax and secrecy havens, all controlled by Russians. This poses a wider question about the capacity of our institutions to prevent these deficiencies from rotting our union from within. It took years for the Commission to start acting on golden passport schemes. Right now, Malta is not even considering stopping its own scheme. We have to call this what it is: selling European citizenship to make dirty money, giving the opportunity to dangerous people or mafia or foreign malicious actors to interfere and exert power in the EU. It needs to stop.

Madam President, European funds for Hungary were frozen because of concerns about whether this money was reaching its legitimate beneficiaries – Hungarian citizens. Years of misuse of this money had shown us that most of the time, it landed in the pockets of oligarchs and helped enrich Orbán’s friends and close relatives. This has ultimately dramatically reinforced the powers of this new autocrat. There is little reason to think the outcome would be different today. It seems the right boxes have been ticked on the right forms, yes, indeed, but no implementation. And we are facing a lot of opacity about the dialogue between the Commission and the Hungarian Government. But above all, one major problem remains the allocation of cases in the judiciary. Through all of these years, the very rare cases of political and corruption trials would land in the hands of judges close to the regime, always the very same judges with a very mysterious but very convenient allocation system. To have serious restoration of the rule of law in Hungary, the allocation of political corruption cases is what needs to be addressed first. But now I want to be very clear on one thing where I feel that we have been misleading stakeholders, ambassadors and citizens. Cutting EU funds to Hungary means protecting our money and it is good. But it will not resolve the systemic rule of law collapse in the country. For this to happen, we need political will and courage coming from the Council. It is a straightforward democratic political process that is clearly written in our rules and Treaties: recommendations, sanctions and the withdrawal of voting rights. When Viktor Orbán no longer has voting rights in the name of Hungary, then he will also no longer be able to use his people and his nation as a leverage for his own benefit. For a few days now, new billboards are depicting Ursula von der Leyen and the Commission as new scapegoats and advertising on an upcoming anti-EU referendum in Hungary. This national consultation named on the defence of our sovereignty as 11 questions, all of them concerning Brussels. Full of lies and misperception. It declares that Brussels wants to create migrant ghettos in Hungary, financial support from Brussels to Palestinian organisation has also reached Hamas, and it finishes with this: they – they being us, of course – want to influence Hungarian politics using money from Brussels and overseas. How are we letting this happen?

Mr President, our sexual and reproductive rights must be a matter of European interest. The freedom to dispose of our body, to protect it and to care for it is a fundamental right that must be able to be exercised and defended like all other European rights. To guarantee these rights and conquer new freedoms, the immense work of civil society and the political struggle are doing a lot. But some constitutional reforms are also needed. As a federalist, I want a functional and more democratic Europe, and we want gender equality that is effective and supported by European legislation in all its dimensions. The European treaties are not distant, abstract texts, which would only concern lawyers and technicians. Instead, let us make them powerful frameworks of empowerment and power for all women, for gender minorities and to fight discrimination. Because dying of sepsis on a hospital bed with a dead fetus in itself, surrounded by doctors who refuse to intervene, this should never have been possible, as it has been in Poland for the last three years. And this should no longer be possible on the territory of the European Union.

Madam President, the EU urgently needs to rethink the way it approaches enlargement. The accession process must increase direct work with civil society, rather than focusing only on bilateral discussions with national governments. The 2023 enlargement package stresses a new momentum for the Western Balkans. Good! But reforms have largely stalled in the region; citizens there are deeply disappointed by their own governments and by the EU. When I meet them in Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina or Montenegro, I am energised by a strong civil society fighting for democratic changes and a more peaceful political debate in difficult, sometimes autocratic, circumstances. We are opening up the accession process to Ukraine and Moldova, but we are not making progress with our neighbours in the Western Balkans. What message does this send to those fighting for European values there? The future of the Western Balkans is in Europe. We have common history and shared challenges: security in the face of Russian aggression, safeguarding democracy, upholding rule of law and protecting the environment. But this means real dialogue and sincere cooperation, not loose commercial relationships with corrupted administrations and despotic leaders.

Madam President, we are once again talking about the situation of rule of law in Malta, and this is very necessary. The murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia has not been investigated efficiently. The mastermind behind it has not yet been convicted. Justice is slow to act and, in general, the culture of impunity still seems to be very present on the island. The public inquiry found that the journalist’s assassination was predictable and preventable. There is evidence linking this to the former government. So why has this not been a wake-up alarm for Maltese politics? Still today, journalists do not feel safe in Malta. And then we have the disease of corruption – corruption scandals coming one after the other, the latest one in March 2023. Investigative journalists revealed a EUR 200 million public contract signed in 2017 by the government, privatising free hospitals. The management was transferred to a company totally incompetent for it. Since then, the deal has been ignored by a court for suspicion of corruption and fraud. So, yes, sometimes it feels like democracy is suffocating in Malta: huge difficulties to access public information, public officials being protected from prosecution, incredible number of lawsuits against journalists, houses collapsing because building standards have not been met, money laundering, golden visas, a polarised landscape maintaining old powers in place, attacks on women’s rights. And I could go on. Yes, in this Parliament, we are all well aware of all of this happening in Malta. But I am also very well aware that if we’ve had in this Parliament a number of debates – numerous debates – about Malta and a number of strong resolutions about Malta, it seems that we never have the time or the opportunity to have in-depth public scrutiny of the situation of the rule of law in other countries, like Greece or Bulgaria, for example, with a high level of corruption and very big threats for journalists. So why is that? I was wondering: is this Parliament suffering from a high sensitivity to rule of law issues only when it’s about countries that are not governed by the EPP?

Madam President, this is not going to make the headlines, it will have a thousand times less coverage than Qatargate and it is not even close to being the perfect, fresh new start that this Parliament needs. But it is a first step towards serious reform, real transparency requirements and preventing future conflicts of interest. Here, in this Parliament, in which it has been incredibly difficult to have this topic on the agenda for so many years, a parliament which has previously been in favour of shutting down any constraint on its members, this has been a lonely uphill struggle most of the time but since Qatargate, we have found a lot more allies in nearly all groups, notably the Socialists. Before me, there were other green MEPs fighting for these changes and in the next term others will come, including the new generation, fighting for these changes and coming from all political groups. Because total opacity on money and side jobs is no longer acceptable. This cannot be framed as free mandate. There is no unlawful right to misuse the money, the public money, or to receive unnecessary money from outside. Public money should not enrich politicians and public policies should not be made under the pressure and interference of dirty money. This is the basis of democracy – we say this to the rest of the world, we say this to our own Member States, we say it to other institutions and we say it to businesses. But in this Parliament, we still look to have the least constraints on MEPs, the least possible. But these rules, now that we have them, they can make a healthy democracy because there is no European healthy democracy without clean European institutions. If we fail this time, we will be heading into the next European elections, sending a signal that this Parliament has no problem sheltering those few MEPs that profit from their mandate at the expense of citizens and democracies.

Madam President, as our House is currently working on modifications to the Rules of Procedure to fight against corruption and strengthen transparency after Qatargate, I would like us to take inspiration from other bodies and parliaments to come up with stronger rules and to better be able to implement them. When we went on a mission to the UK Parliament last month, I was quite amazed by the strict rules that are implemented there to increase integrity and accountability, especially in such a conservative Parliament. It is not often that we can hold the UK up as a good example these days. But let us take this opportunity to learn from our neighbours and make sure that there is a real role carved out for our independent experts working on the conflict of interest and on harassment as full members in our advisory committees. We must put in place clear strict rules on MEPs’ interests, with sanctions for those who decide not to respect them, as well as making these sanctions public and visible on the web page of the European Parliament. Finally, since this world is evolving fast and our standards needs to constantly progress, let’s review our rules on a regular basis to see what is working and what is not.

Mr President, from this PEGA Committee of Inquiry we can learn three important lessons. The first: we urgently need a moratorium and regulation for these new technologies, as we do for weapons. They are intrusive, repressive tools in the hands of those in power, and any citizen can one day be considered suspicious and become the object of constant, secret and terrifying surveillance. Second alarming conclusion: In the European Union, states with fragile finances and authoritarian tendencies have massively monitored their opponents, journalists and activists to silence them. No transparency, no remedies or compensation for victims – Hungary, Poland, Greece, Cyprus and even Spain. Finally, last alert: the wealthiest states, such as France and Germany, do not need to buy software from Israeli companies. They have the ability to create their own surveillance systems, and on those we know nothing.

Madam President, foreign interference is not something that we can take lightly, especially when EU values and our democracies are called into question. In order to safeguard our democracies we all know that the most important is to improve transparency. This is crucial. This means not only for us as Members of this Parliament, but also for think tanks, foundations and the private companies that we work with. However, we need to get the balance right. At times, this narrative of monitoring and legislating against foreign interference veers dangerously close to calling for the censorship and criminalisation of NGOs. But without defending a free and functioning civil society, we cannot claim to defend EU values. Civil society organisations are precisely the actors that have defended EU values, worked to prevent foreign Russian interference in the EU and in its neighbourhood countries, and put pressure on us to act to prevent further authoritarian backsliding. If we criminalise civil society, we run the risk of undermining the very values upon which this Union is built.

Mr President, the Hungarian Government has pushed through new legislation asking citizens to report activities that go against the Hungarian way of life – in other words, anything that does not conform with the official Hungarian Government’s narrative on the rule of marriage, the traditional family or the illiberal democracy. The wording in this legislation was withdrawn this Friday after two months of pressure, coming notably from this Parliament. But let us reflect on what was at stake. A society based on generalised surveillance, where you are encouraged to spy on your neighbours, your colleagues, your friends, and then to denounce them for their personal thoughts or their love life. A new step on the path towards authoritarianism. A society of constant fear, the end of freedom of expression, the end of privacy. This is the world the Hungarian Government wants us all to live in – a parallel world inspired by Vladimir Putin, where minority rights are not protected, where rainbow families are unlawful, where the Russian war in Ukraine is not recognised, where European values and the definition of democracy, the rule of law and fundamental rights are denied, and where disinformation about what the European Union does is on billboards and in official speeches nearly every day. Should we let the Hungarian Government set the agenda of the EU for six months when they themselves say they do not respect what we are and what we stand for? What the European Parliament is asking for is only to start the conversation about this crucial issue.

Mr President, again the Commission is trying to allow unconditional flows of personal data across the Atlantic. Once again, the Commission is using our fundamental rights as collateral in the quest for a closer transatlantic relationship – and, once again, we find ourselves here in this Parliament urging the Commission to do the right thing and not to grant, to the US, an inadequate level of data protection. In the EU, our right to data protection is enshrined in law. Citizens know that the collection of the data is only done when necessary and in a proportional way, and in case of a breach they are able to challenge this in a court of law and to know the outcome. In the US, the executive order that was issued in October 2022 does not take the place of a federal data protection law, nor does it pave the way for the end of the ongoing mass surveillance or bulk collection of data by the US National Security Agency. It also does not change the fact that European victims of US surveillance are unable to seek effective judicial redress. The latest agreement may be called the EU-US Data Privacy Framework, but this new name does not reflect the reality. No sufficient changes have been made in the US to safeguard personal data without significant reforms. It is quite clear that the US does not have an essentially equivalent level of data protection. There is also, of course, a significant risk that all of this will anyway be struck down by the CJEU again. This means more legal uncertainty and disruption for citizens and businesses on both sides of the Atlantic. This debate is about protecting our personal data, but it is also about protecting our EU values, fundamental rights and civil liberties.

Madam President, there is no healthy democracy with corruption. Not only does corruption destroy public services and hurt deeply the finances of a country, but it also creates imbalance in powers, and it fosters a climate of threats and fear because those wanting to uncover corruption need to be silenced by those corrupted. And this is why we have, in the EU, journalists getting killed because they are investigating corruption cases. And the EU is sick because of so much corruption involving high-level politicians, public servants and public funds in so many heavy sectors of the economy – healthcare, transportation, construction, waste management, aerospace and defence, agriculture, food, labour, social protection, a number of European economic sectors. And we know the documented and the most grave situations: Hungary, Malta, Czech Republic, Greece, Croatia, Bulgaria. But in fact, all EU Member States are concerned and we have, for the moment, not been good at all at enforcing our rules. We are very good at saying rules but not at enforcing them.

Madam President, indeed, the Democracy, Rule of Law and Fundamental Rights Monitoring Group (DRFMG) went on a mission to Greece recently, and we made assessments of a number of issues concerning rule of law and fundamental rights. We therefore now need an open debate in this House. It has been, in fact, a longstanding demand from a number of Members of this Parliament, coming from different groups already for a long time, because our concerns are serious. In fact, it’s been nearly one year that we’ve been waiting, because on 9 April 2021, Giorgos Karaivaz was assassinated – a sinister remembrance of the deaths of Daphne Caruana Galizia and Ján Kuciak, journalists all murdered in relation to corruption. That is why we need on this debate, like on others today, a debate in this House. We make this request with a Commission statement, please, because the Council will not be there tomorrow. We will also need a resolution to be voted in April, and we propose to be in the joint debate tomorrow with the 2022 Rule of Law report – and we ask for RCV, of course.