Debate contributions by Roberts ZĪLE

The next item is Parliament's statements condemning the terrorist attack on the Hanoi celebrations in Sydney and solidarity with the victims and their families (2025/3042(RSP)). Merry Christmas, everybody. We will continue to work for tonight.

Mr President, Commissioner, thank you, colleagues, for this very serious debate. It's very good that there were so many colleagues who were speaking here and were very serious on this military mobility issue particularly. I just would like also to remind you that if we will evaluate – and it was done by some military experts – what's going on currently with some sabotage or espionage against infrastructure in the European Union, it's preparedness for Europe's logistics to be destroyed and the European military side to respond. So military corridors, military logistical points are absolutely important. That is why we do not only create new ones and make stronger bridges and stronger railway lines, but we have to also think about securing those already existing lines. So that's where a lot of tasks lie. I would like also to mention some issues which I think we cannot follow, for example, today we started again to speak about who would be European commander instead of NATO – a clear hierarchy of military command. So I think this is not the right time in the preparedness for that, but making our national forces stronger is the most important issue and not to debate, as we sometimes see, the military aviation industry to make a new European plane based on the Eurofighter, or Rafael or Leclerc or Leopard tanks. We have not taken decisions for years. Let us do a variety of military things and it will be better and stronger. War is coming on social issues against war issues, as Mr Auštrevičius already said better. So war is coming in a House where there is weakness. If you will think that Ukrainian soldiers sitting for several months on the frontline didn't have other plans to create ambulances back home in Ukraine, we are wrong on this issue. So we have to be strong. About the children of France who will not die for the others: I would like to remind you that in the Second World War, when we didn't have a NATO, we didn't have an EU, many Americans, many British soldiers and other countries' soldiers died for the freedom of France after the Second World War. We have to be serious and responsible in our serious issues like war or peace.

Mr President, Commissioner, dear colleagues, When we, together with my colleague Petras Auštrevičius, started this report on military mobility as an initiative report, of course we had a lot to know and I, working for many years in the Committee on Transport, of course knew that all these projects, which we call transport TEN-T corridors, many of which are now completely similar to the four military corridors developed by NATO together with the Council of Europe, that this money may not be enough because we believe that everything that could be financed from CEF The Cohesion Fund will not be sufficient to complete these projects. I was also aware, and remembered, that in the current multiannual financial framework, from 2021 to 2027, around seven years ago, the European Council reduced the European Commission’s proposal of 6 billion for military mobility tenders – and which was also supported by the European Parliament – by four times as much as €1.7 billion. I hope that this will never happen again in the context of the new multiannual budget. And at the same time, I was unaware of the amount of bureaucracy currently in place for military mobility in the sections that it takes one month, and in some places even 45 days, to move one team from France to Romania on the mainland. And this is only because in each Member State, and sometimes even within a single Member State, there are their own procedures between the federal states, both in the customs section and for the movement of people, military personnel and similar explosive substances, which, of course, hinders these processes in an absolutely unacceptable form. And also an attempt to digitize, say, the customs declaration form for military convoys, the famous 302 form, then within four years this digitization process ended with the creation of a PDF form. All this shows the Ukrainian experience of the war with Russia that it does not fit anything. Dear colleagues, are we doing the fast progress in the military mobility after we are recognising the current situation? I think yes, be at the same time there are many buts. European Commission, thanks to Commissioner Tzitzikostas and also Kubilius too, your initiative received in the College of the Commission a pretty fast decision and with legislative proposal. This is good news, of course. Good news also that the new MFF increased CEF funding significantly and the MFF envelope for military mobility amounts to EUR 17 billion. Be we have that for the 500 hotspots, we need EUR 100 billion, with the estimation of the transport commissioner. We have had a shift shift in financing, defence and security. We create a military industry with not enough – be with a significant increase of – finances. Be at the same time, we discovered that there are not dual-engine driven locomotives in the European market. We also don't know whether there are diesel engine locomotives. We know that flatbeds are not yet here for heavy military movement techniques. Be at the same time – I would like also to use ‘be’ for a positive note – thanks to all colleague shadow rapporteurs for the fast-track compromise-oriented work, thanks for the rapid legislative proposal, as I said, from the Commission side and also to use a fast-track approach for the year 2026 to finalise this legislative proposal, with the aim to start a new removed bureaucracy in military mobility starting from 2027.

Thank you very much, Commissioner. Thank you for being with us at such a late hour. The debate is closed and the vote will take place tomorrow.