Speeches

Mr President, hybrid war is war, and it is in the light of the war that Russia has declared that we have to read this report As Russian tanks roll into Ukrainian territory, let’s not forget that the invasion has been paid by disinformation, interference and cyber-attacks. This report, which has been brilliantly produced by Sandra Kalniete, is a major and timely contribution to the protection of democratic institutions. It is based on conclusions and findings of experts and researchers but it is a political document demanding political action. The invasion of Ukraine is a wake-up call, and we need to raise awareness of the challenge of a structural confrontation with Russia as the main threat to our security. We simply cannot tolerate the extension of Russian influence, and this report shows how to prevent it. We have enemies. The European Union has been targeted. We know that Russia, whatever the concrete attribution might be, is always there ready to destabilise, be it in Brexit or in the secessionist move by Catalan nationalists or COVID-19. So funding of populist and extremist parties did capture anti-European narratives. The state-owned media, which by no means deserve to be called journalism, are components of a reality that we have to face up to. And it is high time to act, stepping up the efforts and the shared commitment of Member States and European institutions.

Mr President, dear colleagues, seven months ago the European Parliament demanded the Iranian Government the immediate release of Ahmadreza Djalali. Today we reiterate that for Djalali and for the thousands of political dissidents, protesters, activists and members of ethnic, religious and sexual minorities unfairly imprisoned and arbitrarily and summarily sentenced to death by the Iranian regime. But apart from Djalali, Muhammad Jawad, Narges Mohammadi, Akbari-Monfared and so many thousands of peaceful Iranians have no time to spare. It’s a moral imperative that the European Union, with its High Representative at the helm, leads a strong response to the Iranian regime. The response must be followed by the commitment of all its Member States. A response that needs to include further targeted sanctions if necessary, and must include also a UN mission on the ground and an independent investigation into the violations of human rights in this country. And let me say that I wonder if we are being too generous to the Iranian regime because when we speak of the death penalty, even with unreserved rejection of it as this is the case, I mean it suggests that previous judicial procedure, some kind of legality. That is not the case. In fact, there is no death penalty in Iran. There are sheer executions: state murder as a form of crime against humanity. Look at the appalling repression, enforced disappearances and massive executions of political dissidents in the 1988 massacre and notice that there has been no investigation or accountability for these crimes that involve the current leader of Iran in a prominent role. Look at the horrifying record of Iran in executions: at least 275 last year, including 10 women and two child offenders. We cannot turn a blind eye. The European Union is not just another voice in the international arena. The European Union is in a unique position to advocate for the abolition of the death penalty and has a unique responsibility to do so. No other political community in the world carries the moral authority and the credibility to demand the end of this inhumane, irreversible and cruel punishment. We take pride in our human rights standards. We demand respect for the rule of law. Well, we have to live up to the values we hold so dear. Respect for life is not a privilege, it’s a basic right. And where and when this right is violated in such an abhorrent and massive manner, those who suffer – and it is the case of the Iranian people – are entitled to expect from us our solidarity, our support, our awareness and our help.

Madam President, the conditionality mechanism has a legal basis, falls within the competences of the Union and is very clearly defined by the Court. It is about protecting the budget, not sanctioning. There has to be a real link between the infringement and the impact on financial management. The measures have to be proportionate. The application of the mechanism is subject to strict procedural requirements and subject to review by the European Courts. This is not an arbitrary instrument, but a framework of legal certainty both for the EU institutions that have to implement it and for the Member States, for all of them. Now what? Now the Commission and, possibly, the Council have to assume their responsibility. The Court has done what it had to do. Parliament has provided the legal instrument to do so. Because, no matter how many debates we have, recurring debates, sometimes redundant debates, Parliament cannot and must not fill this gap, either legally or politically. The situation – Article 7 and conditionality – is currently on track to become unsustainable. It damages the credibility of the Union, it damages the meaning of the legal instruments we have established and it damages trust and, therefore, the willingness of states to cooperate in many areas. It is not for us to prejudge now what the Commission has to propose and what the Council has to decide in due course. Yes, it is time to insist, to demand that there are proposals and decisions, because at this moment the prudent thing is to act.

Mr President, dear colleagues, I address the chamber today as rapporteur for the legislative package on Europol to ask you to confirm the decision adopted by the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE) to enter into interinstitutional negotiations on the two draft legislative acts, namely the revision of the Europol regulation and the consequential amendment of the regulation on the Schengen Information System. The reform of Europol’s mandate is a long-standing request by this Parliament, and I was mainly motivated by the need to equip the agency with new tools and capabilities to face the digital transformation. Criminals have adapted their modus operandi to the new digital reality, and consequently it is necessary to enable Europol to better support Member States in the fight against these evolving security threats. The two legislative reports, which were adopted by a large majority of 75% of the votes cast in LIBE last week, build on the main elements of the legislative proposals of the European Commission, while introducing additional safeguards to ensure the fundamental rights, in particular, the right to the protection of personal data, are respected. The report, furthermore, includes provisions to enhance parliamentary oversight and the accountability of Europol, marking a substantial progress and striking the right balance between new capabilities and closer democratic scrutiny and oversight. Consequently, I kindly request for your support for both decisions, which gather a broad support in the LIBE Committee, so allowing us to enter into negotiations so we can start the discussion with the Council and the Commission soon with a view to deliver new legislation that will allow Europol to better support the Member States to counter serious crimes and terrorism in full respect of fundamental rights.

Mr President, Commissioner, when more than 1% of the Union's gross domestic product is involved in suspicious financial activities, it is clear that money laundering is a serious financial and fiscal problem, but it is also a serious security problem. That is why we need a two-pronged, integrated approach: on the one hand, surveillance and prevention and, on the other hand, coercion to be able to act effectively, from a police and judicial point of view, against laundering and against the underlying crimes. In that regard, the Commission's initiatives are promising, and I hope they will be improved in the parliamentary debate. Let me refer in particular to the authority that is called upon to coordinate European actions on money laundering, because I understand that it is important that it fits in and strengthens the capacities that already exist in the Union, in particular Europol, to fight financial crime through close mechanisms for coordination and exchange of information that we will have to discuss in due course.

Madam President, allow me to join the words of the Presidency in announcing the Sakharov Prize and in the recognition due by this Parliament to Afghan women. The first thing in my speech is to express the most absolute, most radical condemnation of the acts of violence that bring us to this debate. We have full confidence in the actions of the Italian authorities, which we know are facing this threat with all determination and with all the legal and constitutional instruments at their disposal to prevent anyone who uses, justifies or exalts violence from having a place in a democratic system. It is now up to us to support Italian society and its authorities, and I want to do so here. Violence is fought with the weapons of the rule of law. He is not offered accommodation either on the streets or in institutions. It is a threat to democracy that brings us here to debate, and it is a threat to the security of Europeans and their freedoms. In the real world and now, very worryingly, too, in the digital world. Indeed, we have reason to worry, because this radicalism, this fascism in Europe, appears with different faces: the face of anti-Semitic fascism that threatens and desecrates and wants to perpetuate the violence of persecution against Jews; xenophobic fascism that wants to replace the law with hatred; such nationalist fascism as that which attacks and threatens young militants of my party in the Basque Country and forcibly silences civic organisations defending the Constitution in Catalonia – as happened with the S’ha Acabat! University Association recently in Barcelona; and that fascist populism that talks about the people but divides and confronts them. Democratic systems in Europe face polarising pressure from extremes, which are the worst legacy of the totalitarianisms we have suffered. Therefore, no tolerance, no commitment to those who use violence. Neither when they say they use violence to defend the nation nor when they say they assault policemen to make social revolution.

Madam President, Commissioner, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists warns that, due to the complexity and secrecy of the offshore system, it is not possible to know how much of that money is linked to tax evasion and other crimes and how much it includes funds that come from legitimate sources and have been declared to the competent authorities. The difference between the legal, although it seems inappropriate to us, and the illegal is an essential difference and, to this end, raises different problems and issues. And I say this because we are facing a debate in which sometimes the most striking or the most scandalous is not always the most important thing. And I am referring specifically to the fight against money laundering. We have made remarkable progress, but the most recent police operations once again highlight the enormous dimension of this problem. The ongoing review of European legislation is important. We need legislation, but - and it has been said - we also need implementation and resources. Create a company offshore It's not illegal. But we also know that this legal engineering, associated with tax havens, activated by intermediaries and complicit advisors and enhanced by current digital financial tools and products, forms complex circuits in which the trace of illegally obtained money is lost. We need a strict, realistic and credible assessment of the list of tax havens and cooperation obligations from the European Union. And this Parliament must firmly demand compliance with those obligations.

Mr President, there is no doubt that artificial intelligence is a strategic technology of the 21st century and that this technology also has a place in the field of criminal justice and law enforcement. Today there are forms of crime that can only be combated as effectively as we want if we make innovative technological tools available to law enforcement and the courts. Let us think of money laundering, the financing of terrorism, the proliferation of terrorist content online, trafficking in human beings by immigration mafias or for the purposes of sexual or labour exploitation, or the proliferation of child sexual abuse content, which requires work to identify the victims and identify the perpetrators and the places where the abuses have been committed and which tests the psychological resistance of those who have to do this identification work. It is true that algorithms have to improve and that their risks require surrounding their use with large safeguards. But I am not in favour of absolute prohibitions, but of guarantees such as those laid down in the amendments tabled by my group in relation to prior judicial authorisation. We have to offer an environment that facilitates the development of artificial intelligence, also in those areas that can be described as "high risk", with due guarantees. And let me tell you that when you talk about examples from other cities or other countries, I get the impression that racist biases in these cases are not exactly in the algorithms.

Madam President, in December 2020, the second session of the Antwerp trial was about to start. An Iranian diplomat and his accomplices were being tried and later sentenced for the attempted bombing of the annual gathering of the Iranian democratic opposition in Paris. That day of the trial, the Iranian authorities announced that Ahmadreza Djalali was going to be executed. And today we are coming together in this Parliament in a call to halt his execution again. Terrorism against democratic opposition on European soil; number one executioner of women in the world; unrestrained use of the death penalty; relentless persecution of ethnic, religious and sexual minorities; destabilising strategies in the region; host of al-Qaeda leadership; and now Ebrahim Raisi elected as president – someone under shocking and well-grounded allegations of human rights violations so serious that the UN investigator on human rights in Iran has called for a thorough investigation on the massacre of 1988 and Raisi’s involvement in it. Raisi’s election should end the delusion about the existence of so-called moderates having any role within the Iranian regime. By supporting Djalali, we support the people of Iran, because there is a new Iran that is struggling to emerge, and committed to embrace the democratic principles of governance. So let’s make every diplomatic effort within our reach, as we are supposed to do. But let’s not forget the struggle for democracy, separation of state and religion, gender equality, respect and protection of the rights of minorities. While we urge the Iranian authorities to free Djalali, we should ask how many Djalalis, whether they are European citizens or not, remain locked up in Iranian prisons. And how many of them will be killed unless we strengthen our response to Iran’s autocracy and its determination to prevail over the suffering of its people.

Madam President, Mr High Representative, in a relatively short time we have become aware of the challenge of disinformation, but we have also become aware of the limited means the European Union has to deal with this problem. That is why all the points raised by Parliament are relevant and relevant, both the definition of the StratCom's mandate and the sufficiency of its resources and the most effective coordination between administrative structures. But we have forgotten the sanctions. The Commission had the courage and the wisdom to name the countries that are the source of the most aggressive major disinformation strategies. Well, we must continue on that path. It's not just about detecting, denouncing, neutralizing, attributing. We also need to take the step and speak the language of sanctions to actors, state or otherwise, who use these strategies to destabilize democracy and intoxicate political debate. It's not about defining the truth, it's about pointing out what is a lie. And, although we know that there may be difficulties in attribution, we must not fall into the naivety of thinking that in China, Russia or Iran there are non-state actors who are free to operate. It is therefore necessary for the veil to fall on this reality and for its responsibilities to be exposed and for action to be taken in the language of sanctions, which must be included in all the means available to the Union.

Mr President, Commissioner, it has not been easy to get here: many hours of work, an extremely complex legal and technical debate and a great deal of pressure on the rapporteurs. But this report shows that Parliament has lived up to what was required. The figures for child sexual abuse are appalling. Massive internet consumption during confinement has exposed children's vulnerabilities to predators and sex traffickers. Therefore, my group insisted on expanding the technologies to those that can detect not only the sexual abuse material already known, but also that of new production and the grooming. We are aware that legislation of this nature needs additional safeguards and safeguards and we have introduced them in the new regulations to minimise the risks that privacy may run to the processing of this data. From different positions we have reached an agreement which, reiterating the words of the rapporteur, Mrs Sippel, is a possible and necessary agreement. I sincerely believe that this regulation resolves well the need to reconcile the protection of privacy and the protection of minors. Because, if we came to the conclusion that we have to choose between privacy or protection of minors, then we would have a serious problem. We would have a serious problem as legislators, as fathers and mothers, and as responsible citizens.