What Elissavet spoke about.

The Digital COVID Certificate is an important European achievement that is now producing results. In a short period of time we have been able to be consistent with the demands of European citizens and offer them a pan-European system to facilitate free movement within the Union. Greece is one of the first countries to successfully implement the certificate since May and now the whole of Europe ben

Mr President, hundreds of thousands of European citizens with explosive demonstrations are opposed to punctuality, energy costs and poverty. In France, Italy, Belgium, Portugal, Spain, the catastrophic consequences are already visible. The recent summit, Mr President, Mr Costa, which has divided the European Union, has fuelled the explosion and calls on us all to rise to the occasion. What do we a

Madam President, Mr President, yesterday, the Libyan House of Representatives unanimously approved the ratification of the illegal 2019 Turkish-Libyan Maritime Delimitation Memorandum. We condemn in the strongest possible terms the action that challenges the sovereign rights of Greece and Cyprus, violates the fundamental principles of the international law of the sea and undermines peace, stabilit

Mr President, today's debate on Turkish provocations is not a repetition of previous ones. Turkey is daily escalating its provocative behavior towards Greece with continuous violations of airspace and actions that undermine security and stability in the region. On August 15, Ankara announced the establishment of two illegal marine parks in international waters and in an area within the Greek conti

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, today is a historic date. May 19th is for Greece the terrible memory of the systematic extermination of the Pontic Greeks. It is a day of national remembrance for the atrocities, torture, uprooting and annihilation of a thriving Greek population with a strong national identity from Turkey, which always consciously serves a revisionist policy of contempt for inte

Mr President, the new Pact on Asylum and Migration is a major European success. But it's not enough. There are new facts. For our migration policy to be credible, it must be complemented by an effective system of returns, without which it cannot be sustainable. A strong legal and operational framework, simplification of procedures and effective cooperation with third countries are needed. Where su

Madam President, Commissioner, Mr President, welcome. The martyred Cyprus, which has endured illegal invasion and occupation for more than fifty years, is taking office at a critical time when the Union is suffering from geopolitical changes and dramatic conflicts. We must rise to the occasion dynamically, in response to the revisionist forces threatening our borders, with an autonomous common Eur

Mr President, for ten years as a Member of the European Parliament and a member of the Committee on Civil Liberties and Internal Affairs, I have been following closely the evolution of migration in the European Union. Today we are controlling the phenomenon with organised guarding of the external borders, reinforced Frontex, cooperation of Member States and modernisation of our asylum and migratio

Mr President, Italy, 2016, train collision, 23 dead; Germany, 2016, train crash, 12 dead, 85 injured; Spain, 2013, train derailment, 80 dead, 40 injured. I'm not going on, colleagues. Why were such cases not discussed in plenary? Why is the Tempi tragedy only being discussed, two years after the accident and after a statement by the President of the European Parliament in March this year? Because

Madam President, the increasing use of technology in communication and information, without any control whatsoever, makes more urgent than ever the need to modernise European Union law to prevent and combat child sexual abuse online and offline. The new arrangements in the excellent Lenaers report effectively enhance the safety and security of children and encourage reporting – even taking into ac

Mr President, Commissioner, in the current circumstances there is no European perspective for Turkey. The report rightly points to significant backsliding in the areas of the rule of law, the protection of fundamental rights, freedom of the press and the safeguarding of democratic values. Turkey is not delivering on its commitments to security and stability in the Eastern Mediterranean in the cont

Madam President, Commissioner, the recent arrest of the mayor of Istanbul İmamoğlu, a political opponent of President Erdoğan, with the aim of excluding him from the presidency of 2028, was not surprising. Because during Erdoğan’s ten-year tenure there have been dozens of convictions of journalists, a ban on the operation of media outlets, mass arrests of protesters and total manipulation of justi

Madam President, Commissioner, we welcome the proposal for the new regulation. It is a necessary complement to the proper implementation of the Pact on Asylum and Migration. In recent years we have indeed faced threats to the security of our citizens, also because of our failure to return those who do not have the right to stay on European soil. But return policies are not just Europe's responsibi

Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, this year International Women's Day brings out the strong message for all women and girls: "rights, equality, empowerment", which holds us accountable. Although the 2024 Gender Equality Index shows significant progress in the Union, women continue to face serious inequalities, mainly in the workplace. The gender stereotypes of modern societies cont

Madam President, I welcome the Commission's work programme for 2025. Important initiatives in individual policy areas to strengthen the Union’s competitiveness, resilience and cohesion. I focus on security issues and the implementation of the new Pact on Migration and Asylum, because they are the main pillars of development and progress. To strengthen competitiveness, we need to maintain security.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, let us be honest, migrant smuggling is an important part of organised crime and a key activity for criminal networks operating in the European Union. We have not yet managed to control irregular migration and break the business model of smugglers. Smuggling with sophisticated methods is a high-profit business. More than 90% of irregular migrants resort to the

Madam President, Turkey has since July returned to the policy of provocations against Greece by sea and air at a four-year high after 2020. A few days ago, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan called for Thrace to be included in the Greek-Turkish leaders' talks, calling the region's Muslim minority for the first time Turkish, while Devlet Bahçeli, Erdogan's government partner, claimed that Greece

Madam President, at the European Council on 17 October the issue of immigration was extensively discussed under the weight of new recent initiatives, such as Germany with temporary internal border controls and Italy with the transfer of migrants to Albania. We will not stop stressing that addressing this issue requires responsible implementation by all Member States of the new legislation based on

Madam President, Mr Vice-President, ladies and gentlemen, in recent times, with what is happening in the Middle East and the risk of a generalised war, concern about uncontrolled mass immigration seems reasonable. In the previous term, after many negotiations and collaborations, we completed a balanced pact on asylum and migration, which all member states must implement without exception. It is th

Mr President, at the end of the previous period we voted for a balanced new Pact on Asylum and Migration, which – for the first time – introduces mandatory solidarity and equal sharing of responsibility. Proper implementation of the new rules guarantees the security of European citizens under the following conditions: effectively guarding the Union’s external borders – a mission that recognised Gr

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, the agreement we are voting on today is a resounding response to those who accuse the Union of failing to respond to citizens' major and serious problems. The regulation on situations of crisis and force majeure, which I had the honour of being rapporteur for my political group, the PPE Group, allows Member States to deal with sudden and massive inflows of th

Mr President, the Commission's Rule of Law Report is our impartial institutional tool for assessing the progress of each Member State in matters of the quality of democracy. This year's report acknowledges the significant progress made by Greece and highlights the reforms undertaken by the Greek government to enhance transparency, equality, better financial control of state officials and the safet