Debate contributions by Pernando BARRENA ARZA

Mr President, currently, European individuals are protected from discrimination on the grounds of sex and race in employment and in some areas beyond the labour market. However, the grounds of religion or belief, disability, age and sexual orientation are only protected in relation to employment through the Employment Equality Directive. The European Commission introduced a proposal for a directive covering discrimination on grounds of religion or belief, disability, age or sexual orientation outside of employment in 2008, the anti-discrimination directive. However, the legislative process to date has been slow due to divergent views among Member States. The Commission announced its intention to withdraw the horizontal anti-discrimination directive in its 2025 work programme, but following pressure from civil society and MEPs, it decided to keep the programme as a pending file on its 2026 work programme. Our group wants to urge the Member States to overcome this blockage and adopt this piece of legislation aiming to address the cross-border nature of discrimination and the shortcomings of divergent national rules that Member States cannot resolve alone. Our view is that not adopting the directive would perpetuate unequal protection and continue exposing individuals to discrimination in key areas of daily life. The horizontal anti-discrimination directive would enhance legal certainty, reduce prejudice and increase social inclusion. Furthermore, service providers would benefit from harmonised rules that reduce ambiguity, litigation risks, and reputational harm, particularly in cross-border contexts. So, dear colleagues, let's send a clear message to the Council: please go ahead with the anti-discrimination directive. Don't let it down.

Mr President, currently, European individuals are protected from discrimination on the grounds of sex and race in employment and in some areas beyond the labour market. However, the grounds of religion or belief, disability, age and sexual orientation are only protected in relation to employment through the Employment Equality Directive. The European Commission introduced a proposal for a directive covering discrimination on grounds of religion or belief, disability, age or sexual orientation outside of employment in 2008, the anti-discrimination directive. However, the legislative process to date has been slow due to divergent views among Member States. The Commission announced its intention to withdraw the horizontal anti-discrimination directive in its 2025 work programme, but following pressure from civil society and MEPs, it decided to keep the programme as a pending file on its 2026 work programme. Our group wants to urge the Member States to overcome this blockage and adopt this piece of legislation aiming to address the cross-border nature of discrimination and the shortcomings of divergent national rules that Member States cannot resolve alone. Our view is that not adopting the directive would perpetuate unequal protection and continue exposing individuals to discrimination in key areas of daily life. The horizontal anti-discrimination directive would enhance legal certainty, reduce prejudice and increase social inclusion. Furthermore, service providers would benefit from harmonised rules that reduce ambiguity, litigation risks, and reputational harm, particularly in cross-border contexts. So, dear colleagues, let's send a clear message to the Council: please go ahead with the anti-discrimination directive. Don't let it down.

Madam President, President Trump's plan to stop Israeli aggression in Palestine arrives 67,000 dead late. From the political level, it is nothing but a compendium of restrictions and humiliations for the Palestinian side, demands for disappearance and threats of all kinds that are only made to one of the parties, the Palestinian one, while the red carpet of impunity is extended to Israel. This as a peace plan foreshadows nothing good. It would not be acceptable in any other conflict or anywhere else in the world. In any case, we are not going to be more papists than the pope and we are not going to amend the plan to anyone. If it is finally a plan that serves the part of Palestine, which is the one attacked, we too will be worth it and we will agree that, if at least it serves to stop the genocide against the Palestinian people, it should be agreed and signed as soon as possible. We remain perplexed by High Representative Kallas' lack of initiative and action in this area. We are aware that the treaties do not provide the capacity for executive action in international relations, but their management is marked by brutal inaction that has made the Union an accomplice to the greatest massacre of civilians we have known in recent decades. Thanks to those who want to end Europe's capacity to be a global player, Europe is neither in nor expected in Palestine...

Mr President, Mrs von der Leyen, European citizens are still ashamed of the images and content of your meeting with Donald Trump on 27 July. You have accepted 15% tariffs on European products and committed to million-dollar purchases and investments in favour of the United States. The image that you left for posterity is that of a governor of a colony paying homage to the almighty president of the metropolis. His meeting with the President of the United States is the graphic image of the end of European strategic autonomy and puts the process of European integration at serious risk of unfeasibility. His bet is economic and military subordination to the United States, social cuts to be able to continue buying weapons. To whom? To those United States. And, consequently, to make Europe a necessary accomplice to the genocide against Palestine. Basically, because Europe is neither waiting nor waiting for it and because its capacity for political influence as a global actor is tending towards zero. You are turning out to be an openly anti-European Commission President. Probably, next time we will have to question Donald Trump, who, after his meeting, already boasts of being the president of Europe.

Mr President, since the late 1990s, eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo has been the scene of interconnected conflicts marked by the presence of multiple armed groups, the dispute over control of strategic natural resources and also the consequences of the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. More than seven million people are internally displaced in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and systematic violations of international humanitarian law are more than common. In this context, a peace agreement was signed on 27 June between the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda providing for the withdrawal of Rwandan troops from Congolese territory, the demobilisation of M23 and guarantees for the safe return of displaced persons. Despite scepticism about its implementation, this agreement is a relevant opportunity for de-escalation of the conflict and the creation of conditions for sustainable peace. In parallel, the United Nations Mission withdraws this year and leaves a vacuum in a region with very high levels of violence and instability. The Union should be at the disposal of the Congolese authorities so that they can fully assume the functions of security and protection of civilians. In addition to supporting the terms of the peace agreement, the European Union must move away from neocolonial and extractive visions that are at the origin of the conflict.

Madam President, Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinian people. It has surpassed all the limits of human indecency and humanity today links the name of Israel with that of a country deserving of the utmost contempt on the part of the international community. Israel has repeatedly premeditatedly and flagrantly violated international legality and has consistently waged a campaign of aggression against its neighbouring States. It has attacked Lebanon and Syria, and is now bombing Iran to provoke regime change, making interventionist arguments alongside the United States. We must cut ties with Israel. Israel is already a pariah state for most of the world's decent people, who will never in their lifetime be able to buy an orange of Israeli origin, because they will not be able to erase from their minds that Israel has murdered sixty thousand people in the last year, and half of them, children. Mrs. Kallas, there's nothing to look forward to anymore: the EU-Israel Association Agreement must now be suspended. Europe cannot remain unmoved, much less become a necessary collaborator in genocide.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, the list of recommendations drawn up by this Parliament's PEGA Committee was supported by a large majority: supports from left to right. But today, two years later, we have no record that these recommendations have served any purpose. To begin with, it should be noted that the victims of the use of this software They have not obtained any kind of reparation. None of the European governments involved, in particular Poland, Hungary, Spain and Greece, have given explanations or cleared up responsibilities of any kind. And, in addition, we know that Morocco has used that software against political officials and journalists, mainly from Spain and France, and no legal action or diplomatic complaint has been taken as a result of such interference by a country outside the Union. Thus, the final feeling, as I said, is that the new digital tools allow non-legitimate uses against citizens and their rights, and that, finally, no one is accountable for it. I want to take this opportunity to recall that Israel is today a reference in the production of technological tools for the violation of human rights and in the deployment of military technology for the genocide of Palestine. You must both finish now. Suspension of the EU-Israel Association Agreement now!

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, forty years ago the Schengen Agreement was presented as the great step forward that was to give practical form to European law on the free movement of persons and goods and, in fact, today citizens still consider the free movement of persons to be one of the most tangible achievements of the European Union. The reality is that, 40 years later, some Member States – such as Germany, France, Austria, Denmark, Sweden, Slovenia and Italy – put in place temporary road border controls and hinder the free transit of persons. Particularly striking are the cases of Germany, which has land border controls in place at nine points until 15 September, and France, which has been communicating in a concatenated manner notices of exceptionality at its borders since before the COVID-19 pandemic and, lastly, until October this year. We find, therefore, that there are Member States that have been abusing the Schengen Regulation, which move a situation of permanent exceptionality to control borders, which causes serious damage to cross-border communities, which suffer unnecessary delays and discomfort in their day-to-day lives, in addition to creating conditions of insecurity for migrants wishing to access the European Union. It is an abuse that, in addition to inconvenience, creates danger and is costing lives, as in the Bidasoa border, where ten migrants have already died.

Madam President, the announcement of the revision of the EU-Israel Association Agreement is a victory for all of us who have denounced the genocide that the State of Israel continues to commit with Palestine. But this review is late; 50,000 Palestinian dead late. Israel has almost totally annihilated a people, we have allowed ethnic cleansing against Palestine, and now you are telling us that you are going to think about it? There are more than enough reasons to denounce non-compliance with the human rights safeguard clause (Article 2 of the EU-Israel Association Agreement). Madam Vice-President Kallas, unilaterally and immediately suspend the Agreement now. How many thousands more Palestinians have to die before Israel ceases to have a privileged political and economic relationship with the European Union? What else is there to check? Israel is forcing Palestinians in Gaza to starve, and they need the European Union to exert maximum pressure to prevent them from starving to death. Massive humanitarian aid is urgent and undelayable. Now, please, now!

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, at this point we still do not know for sure what caused the blackout on 28 April in the Iberian Peninsula, but it is true that it has at least served to make us aware of the vulnerabilities of the electricity system and to point in certain directions. It is out of time and place to take advantage of the bewilderment to blame all this on renewable energy, as if the issue of combating climate change were optional. Renewable energies are part of the solution and, therefore, it is mandatory to carry out large investments in infrastructure, because renewable energies contemplate new challenges in the management of the electricity network, as is the case of storage management. We have enough technology for that. We even have the means to reach an electricity grid with 100% renewable energy. And it is a paradox that, when electricity companies have had stratospheric profits for years, the need for investment in improving and renovating infrastructure is a challenge. The liberalisation of the sector has left the location and sizing of electricity production in the hands of market profits – in the case of the Spanish State, in the hands of the four large electricity companies, which control the Spanish electricity grid. And I mean that electrical infrastructures are critical infrastructures. Therefore, they should be in public hands, away from economic interests that do not benefit.

Madam President, High Representative, we would like to express our strongest support for the continuation of the European Union's Political Dialogue and Cooperation Agreement with Cuba. The Cuban people have been suffering for sixty-five years from an unfair trade embargo that greatly limits their productive capacities and causes significant damage to the quality of life of their residents. The lack of respect for international legality was not invented by Russia with the invasion of Ukraine or Morocco and Israel with the invasions of Western Sahara and Palestine respectively: As early as 1960, after the triumph of the Revolution, the United States decided to punish harshly a people who had decided not to follow orders, to own their own destiny and to carve out their own path. I want to say that I believe that it is not necessary to be a communist to defend the dignity of Cubans and their right also to organize and to have the political system that they and they consider. It is called respect for the right of self-determination of peoples and non-interference. The continuing emergency situation caused by the embargo means that citizens cannot develop their lives normally, and Trump's access to the US presidency can worsen this situation. It is therefore imperative that the Union strengthens the frameworks for political and economic solidarity with Cuba.

Madam President, the people of Greenland already overwhelmingly opt for pro-independence parties and have made it clear that they want Greenland to be an independent state. It is now lacking for Greenlandic citizens to be able to decide freely and formally, and for the international community – particularly the United States, Russia, Denmark and the European Union – to respect its final decision on the matter. It is the same as we wish for all stateless nations that aspire to be European states. The Conference on the Future of Europe found that the exercise of the right of self-determination for stateless nations is one of the concerns of citizens when drawing the future of the Union. In these times of geopolitical ups and downs, when Europe has to establish its position and decide what the future of the process of political integration will be, keep in mind that the European stateless nations – Greenland, Euskal Herria, Catalonia, Flanders, Scotland, Brittany and many others – are committed to the European project and consider that their future is linked to that of Europe. Therefore, the European institutions are obliged to support the right of self-determination of Greenland's citizens and help them to confront this new-found imperialism of the US administration. European stateless nations, such as the Basque, have our right to freely and democratically decide our future.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, it is 110 years since the genocide against the Armenian people. It is estimated that almost two million people were deported and massacred by the Ottoman Empire. Turkey then, as today Israel against Palestine, has always denied that the massacres of Armenians were genocide but the truth is that it was a systematic plan of ethnic cleansing against a people who suffered, for the first time in history, all kinds of violations of individual and collective human rights. A century later, we have the feeling that the operation that Azerbaijan carried out a year ago against Nagorno-Karabakh was a continuation of the genocide of 1915, an ethnic cleansing of the entire Armenian population of Artsakh, an ethnic cleansing preceded by all kinds of war crimes. Azerbaijan's role does not end in its inquin against the Armenians. It is an element of destabilization of the region that seeks the elimination of any political or cultural presence outside the Turkmen tradition in Central Asia, Iraq and Syria. All this as a State proxy Turkey, a true regional factotum, which aspires to a corridor of confidence that will allow it to access this area of Central Asia mentioned above. Today the enormous tragedy caused by Israel in Palestine hides other crises. But we do not forget that tens of thousands of Armenians from Karabakh are now refugees and that Baku continues to hold twenty-three Armenian political prisoners who are victims of sham trials and without any procedural guarantees. We believe that Europe cannot sacrifice its commitment to human rights and legitimise the Azeri ethnic cleansing against Nagorno-Karabakh and its permanently aggressive attitude against Armenia – by Azerbaijan, I mean. Armenia has the right to have a State respected by the international community. This applies particularly to Azerbaijan and the European Union must be involved to do so. We Europeans have a historic debt to Armenia that we must repay in terms of solidarity, commitment, and helping to deter Azerbaijan and Turkey from any temptation of aggression today.

Mr President, Azerbaijan holds the painful record of having made a country disappear overnight without the international community paying too much attention. It's almost two years since Azerbaijan completed an ethnic cleansing of the entire Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh: it emptied the country of Armenians and replaced them with Azeri individuals. Furthermore, we cannot forget that Azerbaijan is an authoritarian state where any legitimate political dissent is cracked down. We must demand the release of the 23 Armenian prisoners of war who are being subjected to sham trials, violations of due process and trumped‑up charges. In this regard, it's particularly important for the International Criminal Court to investigate the cases submitted by the Ombudsman of Nagorno-Karabakh and provide a judicial response to the cases of forced expulsion and ethnic cleansing committed by Azerbaijan against the Armenian population of Artsakh. As this violent approach by Azerbaijan has the whole Armenian community in its sights, I have a direct question to High Commissioner Kallas: are you ready to impose the same sanctions against Aliyev if he invades Armenia, as the European Union has imposed against Putin after the invasion of Ukraine?

Madam President, in the 1970s Israeli soldiers stood in front of a block in Gaza and whistled. All the Arabs in the bloc had to run away because if they weren't beaten, they were women, the elderly or babies. These are the words of Itzhak Ini Abadi, the Israeli governor of Gaza in the 1970s. Therefore, let no one come and tell us that it all started on 7 October 2023. In Palestine, a spiral of violence has ended with respect for human rights and at the vortex of that violence is Israel's illegal occupation of Palestine, which has a system of violence in place. apartheid He is a politician who treats Palestinians as subhumans without rights. We denounce the genocide of 60,000 people in Gaza and now we must expose the inhumane living conditions in the area, the power and water cuts and the absence of health care. Israel does not respond to reasons because it is not a democratic country, but the European Union must demand that UNRWA, humanitarian aid and all kinds of supplies be allowed in and that it comply with its ceasefire commitments. Commissioner, at this stage, continuing to keep the Association Agreement with Israel in force is not negligence, it is collaborationism with war crimes. They are sinking the international reputational prestige of the European Union. Not on our behalf.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, when the Assad regime fell last December, we all knew that Hayat Tahrir al-Sham and Ahmed al-Shara, the self-proclaimed president of Syria, are related to Al Qaeda and that the Syrian National Army was a subsidiary force of the Turkish Government, both with a long history of human rights actions and violations of international law. Once again, history repeats itself and jihadist groups take control of countries in the face of the complacency of the great powers. It happened with Afghanistan, it happened with Libya, and now it has been deliberately encouraged to happen in Syria. We cannot accept that the new Syrian Government will repress the various national or religious communities in the country, unless it ends their lives, as we have just seen in the case of the Alawites. It is essential to bet on a new future for Syria that guarantees the plurality of the country, that counts particularly on the Kurds to organize their future and that respects the autonomous administration of Rojava as fundamental to that objective. I want to take this opportunity to welcome the dissolution of the PKK, which will undoubtedly bring stability to the area, at least for the Kurdish side. It is good news that must be reciprocated by Turkey with the immediate release of Öcalan and the acceptance of the Kurdish differential national fact.

Mr President, Commissioner, reducing strategic dependence in the area of critical communication infrastructure is crucial to moving forward decisively on the concept of European sovereignty. A technologically sovereign and secure telecommunications system of European obedience is an indispensable tool not only in the field of critical communication infrastructures, but in all communication infrastructures in general. Europe cannot be at the mercy of large companies representing geopolitical interests alien to Europeans. At the moment other powers and particularly the United States are using their advanced position on this issue as a tool of hard power, which, as we all know, is not limited only to the threat of military power, but also to economic and technological pressure. That European states are dependent on Starlink, as Italy has just done, is a disaster because it leaves such a delicate area as critical communications in the hands of a worldview that only thinks about how to mow the grass under Europe's feet and leave it without options in the international concert. Betting on Europe's sovereignty requires sovereign means and ensuring that the necessary technology deployment compensates for its carbon footprint and also allows public access to networks on a universal basis.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, the lack of medical professionals in our public health systems is due to different factors that have to do with poor working conditions and low wages. We already know the cause: past and present austerity policies and cuts in social spending, which have plummeted the quality of many public health systems that were exemplary and that today are sustained thanks to the professionalism of workers. Therefore, it is unacceptable that now, in the face of the precarious situation of public health, those responsible for the policies of social cuts and all those who preferred to reduce social spending should put their hands on their heads. Increased public investment in health, improved working conditions and more balanced and realistic access to medical schools: those are the recipes to turn the situation around. And all this is expensive, but of course we have money to do it. Another thing is that the right wing of this House prefers to spend it on armaments. The increase in military spending leads us to the collapse of social spending and this will be impossible for them to hide.

Mr. President, I want to join the widespread concern about the autocratic and conservative consequences that Trump's rise to the presidency of the United States will generate for the peoples of Europe and particularly for the popular classes. And I also want to stress that the geopolitical role of the United States does not depend on who is in the White House. It is true that there are important – very important – nuances, but both Republicans and Democrats feel that the United States must lead the world and extend democracy, whatever the cost. And that is also done through military coercion, which defends interests that, at least, are not those of the European Union. The United States will never allow any regional power to maintain aspirations for global power: is consubstantial to its political culture, and that also applies to the European Union. Therefore, it is highly contradictory to advocate strategic autonomy for Europe and at the same time that the Member States of the Union belong to NATO, a military alliance created to impose the foreign policy of the United States, a policy that, at least, is not ours and that cannot be ours because it aims, among others, that the European Union has no influence on the world political order. A reflection on European sovereignty and its role in the geopolitical game beyond mere subordination to US foreign policy and colonialism is therefore fundamental at this time.

Madam President, I'm going straight to the point. We are also talking here about European strategic sovereignty and this has been made clear in many of the previous speeches. There is a mantra in this Parliament that denounces interference in electoral processes, but it is only directed towards Russia, ignoring that the United States and some EU Member States also do so when they consider it appropriate, and the Sahel states, Venezuela and Georgia are a clear example of this. Large social networks are being used in the service of a determined political agenda. The problem is not the self-interested orientation of a media outlet for political purposes – which could be entirely legitimate – but how algorithms are manipulated or bot farms are organised to amplify groups and ideas that, in an advantageous and democratic way, intend to take those positions. We need the Commission not just to investigate and act. It has the necessary tools for this and not acting is not avoiding confrontation, it means letting go and that totalitarian political agendas continue to run at ease. There is an urgent need to apply the sanctioning regime of the Digital Services Act, because we cannot allow hate speech and totalitarian content to be the axes of a business model in social network format.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, Commissioner, the problem is not tourism, but the lack of regulation. The model that we have in force in a generalized way is the so-called "the more, the better". But on a finite planet there can be no infinite economies and growths. The same goes for our towns and cities and tourism. The lack of regulation causes problems of gentrification, because these neighborhoods and cities that are tourist destinations are no longer livable, and the processes of gentrification end up expelling the locals. The key, once again, is in a sustainable model of tourism that puts in the centrality the well-being of the citizens who live in places with tourist attraction. Sustainable tourism is related to the tourist load capacity of a community that is limited and requires that this activity be linked to a physical, economic and social environment that is not harmed by its development. Ladies and gentlemen, tourism must be governed, and public administrations at all levels must have the powers and instruments to regulate it. Tourism is a global phenomenon, but local intervention is essential, because tourism does not affect all places in the same way. This is the focus of the citizen mobilizations in southern Europe of the Cities and Peoples for Living movement and the SET Network. Tourism needs regulation now and the European Union has to be an active subject for this.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, our deepest condolences to the families and the environment of the people who died in the environmental emergency of the the Valencià Country and Albacete. All the solidarity and support shown has to be transformed into deeds because, two weeks after the DANA of October 29, it is still being cleaned up and only now are towns and cities being rebuilt. It is necessary to activate the European Union Solidarity Fund and to provide immediate financial support that will enable the families of the victims and all those affected to be accompanied of all kinds – health, psychological, work-related – so that they can begin to rebuild their lives and their peoples. Denialism and climate retardism are no longer mere extravagance, they are a position that has criminal political responsibilities. The consequences of climate change, the aggravation of all meteorological phenomena, such as droughts, extreme heat and floods, are more than evident to those who want to see them. Today's misfortunes are heirs to that reality which involves subjecting everything to the most brutal speculation and private profit. I want to say that, in Spain alone, three million people live in flood zones and, to protect their lives, measures must be taken: firstly, to prohibit new construction in flood areas and, to that end, to provide local authorities with high economic and legal capacity.

Madam President, on this point about the persistent threats to marine protected areas and coastal communities, I would like to draw the attention of the Honourable Members to a project for the construction in Gernika (Basque Country) of a new Guggenheim museum in the heart of the Urdaibai biosphere reserve, which is an estuary at the mouth of the Oca River to the Cantabrian Sea, in the Atlantic Ocean. We are talking about a project that violates European legislation by considering the Urdaibai Marsh, a Special Protection Area for Birds or SPA and, therefore, part of the Natura 2000 Network. In this area, declared of special protection, it is estimated that around 140,000 visitors would circulate annually, according to the promoters of the museum, which is absolutely nonsense. This situation means that the project has a huge opposition from the inhabitants of the place, who demand to stop this project because they believe that it puts at risk an area that should be especially protected and that needs a development plan according to the value of the environmental environment of Urdaibai. We want to call on the Commission to act accordingly, to protect the environmental interests of the citizens of the area and not to allow the absolute deterioration of this coastal area, protected by a figure designed by the European Commission itself such as the Natura 2000 Network.

Madam President, like any disruptive change, the enormous advantages derived from the use of new technologies also have another side, in this case provided by the dehumanization that allows anonymity. The growth of far-right positions has a lot to do with manipulation online to spread hateful and undemocratic messages, from the deepfakes the mere mass dissemination of false and defamatory information: anything goes. And even the new majorities in this Parliament have a lot to do with the use of these dark resources. I think you guys understand me. It is especially serious that the platforms that allow this behavior are in the hands of tycoons who exploit them in pure and hard business. They are business accounts that have no interest or social responsibility and those who are not interested in truthfulness or public interest. There is a need for new platforms, new moderated tools in truthful and legitimate content, above profitability and the income statement, which prioritize the public interest. There is no private initiative that ensures the public interest; this can only be guaranteed from the public sphere and, therefore, we call on the next Commission to send us a reflection on how from this European public sphere new platforms can be created that go beyond the current business model and guarantee public utility.