Debate contributions by Erik KALIŇÁK

Madam President, in the United States, a patriot and a sovereign politician have won, not an exorbitant system of globalists. That is why I am delighted with Donald Trump's victory, even though it is undoubtedly a difficult period for Europe from an economic point of view. The problem, however, is not with Donald Trump, but with who sits opposite him at the negotiating table and represents our European interests. We are scourging Draghi's report on the decline in our competitiveness for a month in vain, when the President of the European Commission's response to four times more expensive energy than the US, which has been battling European companies and entrepreneurs in recent years, is: Let's give up Russian gas, let's diversify into the American one, which she says is even cheaper. This is what a politician from a country that reproaches India, for example, says that it began to take large quantities of Russian gas after the outbreak of the conflict in Ukraine. However, he will no longer say that imports of Indian gas – and I am now putting quotation marks – to Germany increased by 1 100% last year. Yes, you hear it right. Germany last year elevenfold imported gas from India, and we are all pretending that it is certainly not Russian gas. In the evening, we will even discuss whether to place Russia in the category of high-risk countries. I ask, how long are we going to deal with Ukraine's wet dreams instead of European interests?

Madam President, massive illegal migration poses an existential threat to Europe. However, many Western countries have downplayed this threat for decades and are now reaping the bloody consequences of their sunshine naivety. Anyone who warned them of the dangers of open-door migration policies was described as a xenophobia, racist or extremist. And today they are shocked that their extremists are gaining a majority in one Member State after another. When will we also understand in this House that illegal migration is not the right thing to do? Our task is not to endlessly deal with its unmanageable consequences, but to stop it once and for all. Redistribution of immigrants, the demolition of Schengen or the migration pact: none of this works because none of it solves the cause of irregular migration. The only workable solution to this problem is strict control of the external borders and only then comes a strict return policy. Only immigrants who have been carefully checked and legally authorised to enter the European Union are required to do so. Everyone else is behind the border, the external border of the European Union. Yes, the solution is really that simple. So please, let's stop pretending that after a decade we are suddenly going to look for some innovative solutions, because we are already really laughing. Of course, this solution also costs a lot of money, but what deserves it more than the safety of our citizens? If we can give tens of billions to a non-member state to protect it, we must also be able to find them to protect our borders, our way of life, our Europe.

Mr President, for understandable reasons, I will talk about the part of the rule of law report that concerns Slovakia, because it contains a shameful number of factual errors. For example, you complain to the Government Office that on 1 July this year it abolished the Corruption Prevention Department as the central body for coordinating corruption prevention and reallocated its tasks to the Prime Minister's Office. Well, it just doesn't fit the date. The Prime Minister's Office does not exist in Slovakia. The Corruption Prevention Department is not a central body. That is the government office, and it did not redistribute the tasks of this department, but elevated them to the level of the state security section, thus giving them greater importance. Furthermore, the Commission criticised the power of the Attorney General to overturn the decision of the lower prosecutors through Section 363. It bothers you that he can do so without any justification and that the investigators have no choice but to start again and gather new evidence, which allegedly must be different from the original evidence. Dear Commission, every decision of the Attorney General in Slovakia must and is often justified on hundreds of pages, and investigators can re-use all the original evidence, provided that it has been obtained lawfully. That is what the rule of law is about. Within a minute, I was able to draw attention to two factual mistakes made by the Commission, but know that I could speak here for dozens of minutes.

Madam President, when I asked Commissioner Johansson in committee what specifically made her feel threatened by the Hungarian national card, I was told that her main problem was that these permits were obtained by Russians and Belarusians, who, in her opinion, today, regardless of the severity of the control, pose a security risk to Schengen. Of course, repeating such a thing about illegal immigrants that are not controlled by anyone would make us extremists and racists spreading hate speech. Even if I accept the Commissioner's concerns, I still do not understand why we are talking today about Hungary and not about Germany, which granted the most such permits to Russian citizens last year. Or about Poland, which keeps these statistics for Belarusian citizens. By the way, Hungary is in eighth place. According to official Eurostat data, there were about 720,000 Russians and 85,000 Belarusians in the European Union last year. But you have decided that the security of Schengen is endangered precisely by the Hungarian ten Russians and four Belarusians who have obtained a national card this year. It's ridiculous! This debate is in fact just another disgusting attack on a sovereign Member State and the embodiment of a Slovak proverb: Anyone who wants to beat a dog will find a stick.