Speeches

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, freedom of the press is a thermometer of democracy, it is a constitutional pillar. Where journalists feel threatened, intimidated or targeted, no citizen can fully enjoy their rights and freedoms. We see it in authoritarian countries, such as Putin's Russia; We saw it in the Gaza Strip, where more than 200 journalists were killed. in Serbia, where the lack of press freedom is an obstacle to integration into our Union. But what happens within the European Union? In Italy, freedom of the press seems to be tolerated: More than 250 journalists are under surveillance, 22 of whom are under escort. Roberto Saviano said well: When you turn a journalist into a public target, sooner or later someone will think they can hit off-screen as well. And it is often politics that ignites the fuse of this process, politics that, instead of responding to ideas or investigations, proceeds to build media campaigns to isolate and discredit those who dare to investigate power. I express all my solidarity with Sigfrido Ranucci, his loved ones and all the journalists who like him do not give up to tell uncomfortable facts. I call on all politicians to guarantee freedom of the press at all times: It is a cross-cutting battle for all of us.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, last September two Italian lawyers asked the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights to open a formal investigation into the situation of the Kurdish activist, Pakhshan Azizi, who was arrested in Iran in 2023 and sentenced to death in 2024 for providing humanitarian aid to women and children fleeing Islamic State attacks. The UN said that in 2025, in just nine months, more than 1,000 people were executed in Iran: These are convictions perpetrated following unfair closed-door trials in the context of torture practices and forced confessions. The European Union will have to support the complaint submitted to the UN in support of Pakhshan Azizi and put pressure on him to respond as quickly as possible. Let us be the bearers of concrete and coordinated diplomatic action to stop the wave of executions taking place.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, mental health is one of the great evils of our time. It strikes in a transversal way, no one is exempt from it, but it is the weakest who suffer the heaviest consequences. In particular, it is the very young who manifest the most obvious signs of these diseases, which are often not detected promptly, determining even for families a burden that they cannot bear. Eating disorders increase, self-harm increases, anxiety, aggression and school dropout increase. Despite this, mental health care is not included in public health benefits and people are left alone. The consequences do not fall exclusively on those directly affected, but on society, which on the one hand loses human resources and on the other risks having problematic subjects abandoned to themselves. Greater efforts are needed, both in Europe and in the Member States, to include mental health as one of the priorities in a true European Health Union that we must complete.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, Commissioner, the earthquake that struck north-east Afghanistan killed more than 2 000 people. Of these, there are certainly more women than men. Why? Because, because of the laws imposed by the Taliban, women cannot be touched by men. In fact, the rescuers, who were obviously all men, because we remember that women cannot work, let them die under the rubble simply because they could not touch them. In addition, women are denied health care, even emergency care that could save their lives. And this is because, always women, it is forbidden to work as doctors. What we are witnessing is an intolerable violation of every right, it is the denial of every freedom based exclusively on gender. This represents apartheid, gender apartheid, and we should all have the courage to recognize this crime within international law and within European legal civilization.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, the effects of climate change continue to affect European citizens; think about the effects on our territories, with increasingly frequent disasters, or the effects on health. Relapses are not the same for everyone: they affect the most fragile people more strongly, representing a further push towards inequalities and increasing social differences. Over the last few summers, many Europeans have experienced unprecedented heatwaves: In addition to urgently addressing the root causes of climate change, we as institutions must also take responsibility for mitigating the most tangible effects from the outset. Europe needs to take up the theme of social housing, the modernisation of the homes of the already most fragile people, urban planning that can help make our cities more livable and ready to respond to these difficult challenges. Cities suffer in a grip that pushes for an increasingly massive use of air conditioners, which in turn pollute and make our cities even warmer. Structural measures and adequate funds are needed to help our citizens improve their quality of life and to protect our environment.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, one thing is certain: There is no turning back in Serbia. The last ten months of protest and awareness by Serbian citizens, not just students, have marked a profound turning point in the history of the country, which cannot be ignored either by the Serbian leadership or by the European institutions. From here and from the demands of thousands of citizens who took to the streets it is necessary to start again, to build a new country. On the part of the European Union and this Parliament, it is not a question of supporting a Serbian candidate or party, it is a question of upholding European values. It is naive to think that the European Parliament can support a government that allows violent repression of demonstrations, dismisses civil servants because they participate in protests, gags the press, plays dirty with the electoral process: There is no place in the European Union for all this. We expect, instead, and I assure you we really hope, to welcome into our European family a different Serbia, a democratic and free Serbia.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, not many days ago I received a phone call from a colleague who warned me that thousands of my photos had been published on a sexist and pornographic website, and fed to the most obscene comments up to the incitement to rape. I wasn't the only one: On that site were portrayed, without their knowledge, many women, politicians and not only. For at least 15 years, photos of this type were uploaded and, for at least ten years, complaints were made, yet the managers continued, undeterred, to feed this digital carnage. A few days earlier another Facebook group had been denounced, in which husbands and companions posted photos of their wives, always without their knowledge, and then exhibited them as slaughter meat in a sexist landfill and unrepeatable in content. This is the tip of an iceberg. Measures are needed to stop these new, insidious forms of gender-based violence, first and foremost by targeting the managers, who should be legally and commercially responsible. Sexual and affective education, then, in schools becomes more and more a priority to build a civilization of respect and, I add, of freedom. There can be no freedom where there is violence and abuse.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, almost ten million people are in need of humanitarian assistance in South Sudan, where cholera, hunger and the world's highest neonatal mortality rate are rampant. A country where rape is a common weapon of war. Unlike others, this is a totally forgotten conflict. South Sudan is on the precipice of a new total war. Political tensions led to violence, militias, bombardments between rebels and the army, ethnic profiling, arbitrary detentions, attacks on civilians and hospitals, such as that of Médecins Sans Frontières, detonated with a nine-month-old child inside. The population flees to fragile countries, thus exacerbating already existing crises. We must strongly call on the government to return to the 2018 peace treaty, release political prisoners, end hostilities and secure access for humanitarian aid. Let's not let the attention go down.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, in 2022, reports of online sexual exploitation of children increased by 30 times compared to 2010. Live streaming, dedicated channels, images are proliferating on the net deep fake and generated with artificial intelligence, allowing perpetrators to hide and escape criminal sanctions. The European Union must react strongly, starting with the broadening of the definition of child sexual abuse material, including artificially generated content and abuse manuals with certain severe penalties, which cannot be fooled. We need an approach that puts children at the centre with respectful investigations and adequate psychological support. To really protect them we also need close cooperation between states, agencies such as Europol and Eurojust and NGOs, because the network knows no borders and even our protection must not have them.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to thank the Commission and Commissioner Minzatu for this road map on women's rights. I am happy to have found in the text references to crucial battles for the freedom of so many women. However, I ask that these are not just nice words spent on 8 March: concrete commitments need to be made through legislative and non-tangible measures. Gender-based violence remains a scourge: One in three women is a victim in Europe. How long will it take to agree on a definition of rape linked to lack of consent? How can we promote projects that teach our children respect for bodies and people? Then the crises we have faced, which we have not yet solved: I am thinking of COVID, the energy crisis, poverty, climate change. Women pay the highest price. Concrete measures are needed to alleviate its effects. Finally, the theme of health: We need to invest in programmes that finally highlight appropriate gender medicine. Health must be an accessible and quality right for all. We no longer want to continue to treat ourselves with diagnoses and medicines designed for a male body.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, the European right is no longer hiding. A few years ago they praised Putin, who then brought the war back to Europe, causing a global crisis that we still pay for today. Instead, they are now humiliating our countries by applauding Trump, who is about to hit our production system, our businesses and our workers with unprecedented tariffs, which will cost jobs and drive up product prices. They are the anti-Europeans, the anti-Italians, the patriots on the contrary. Salvini, Meloni and the right, even in this Parliament, are silent in the face of this unprecedented commercial aggression. They kneel in front of their new master and dump on the Green Deal all their inadequacy. The truth is, they have nothing patriotic about them. They spread hatred, they sow violence, but they have no plan for the future. We still believe in a future of development, for a Europe that is fairer, a Europe that also knows how to take care of rights and freedoms.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, the rule of law, the fight against corruption, the freedom to demonstrate and the independence of the judiciary are the reasons why thousands of students, and others, have peacefully taken to the streets in recent months. Joining them is a chorus of demands that would allow Serbia to shed light on the tragedy of Novi Sad and to build a more just country, free from corruption. It is a force born from below, from young people who do not recognize themselves in a political movement. Yet, we European politicians cannot help but express our support for these peaceful demonstrators, since their demands are the same as those expressed by the accession process to Europe. We give voice to these young people and we ask, together with them, that the government know how to clearly answer the questions that are asked, that the government respond to the alleged corruption and that the judiciary ascertain responsibility for the tragedy in Novi Sad. All this in a peaceful climate and respectful of the right to demonstrate, which must be recognized in all democracies.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, during the pandemic we discovered the value and importance of the work of our doctors and healthcare professionals. Now that, fortunately, we are no longer in a health emergency and that the political priorities are other, many have forgotten about it. But the shortage of personnel weighs both on the operators themselves, called every day to decide on the lives of people under conditions of unacceptable stress and pressure, but also on patients, who are not provided with the service they would need. Our group has long called for the European Health Union to be more than just a profit-making project. business, but that it is a social union and rights. In the context of the European Health Union, I therefore ask the Commissioners present - I see Commissioner Mînzatu here - to present a European plan for health workers, a strategy with funds and concrete regulatory measures, to give breathing space to our doctors and operators and stop this very dangerous drift. This is demanded by health personnel, but also by citizens, who have the right to a public health accessible to all and of quality.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, the courage of women frightens the Iranian regime. Kurdish activist Pakhshan Azizi is sentenced to death in Evin Prison, the same hellish place where Cecilia Sala was detained. Two women, two different stories, but united by a place that is a symbol of oppression and violence. It is courage, like that of Pakhshan, who chose to fight for rights, that the Iranian regime fears the most, especially if it is women who fight for freedom. The authorities respond with death sentences – which in 2024 amounted to 900 – with isolation and torture, targeting ethnic minorities more in order to establish terror and consolidate power. We call for the immediate release of Pakhshan Azizi, Verisheh Moradi and all those unjustly imprisoned and sentenced. As this Parliament has repeatedly called for, I would also like to reiterate the need to include the Revolutionary Guards on the list of terrorist organisations in the European Union. Enough with the hypocrisy, do it soon. Freedom and human rights must not and cannot know borders. Woman, life, freedom.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, Nariman al-Fasih, 35, lived with three children in a crumbling tent in the southern Gaza Strip. On Christmas morning she woke up at dawn to breastfeed her youngest child. "His body was cold, motionless," he said. I turned on the phone light and noticed that her skin was blue and bleeding from her mouth. I put my ear on his chest, but I didn't hear his heartbeat. At the end of December, six children died of cold in the Strip – children already weakened by famine and exposure to cold, children of whom no one has spoken. This weekend we have seen the embraces of hostages and prisoners who have finally returned home, but nothing can erase the violence and war crimes we have witnessed. We must ensure a future of peace based on respect for people and international law. Let's do it soon, for all the children who have the right not to die of hunger and cold.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, thirty years since the Beijing Declaration, which ignited a flame of hope for millions of women around the world. Today, however, gender-based violence is still entrenched in our communities. We have not yet succeeded in disrupting that patriarchal culture, made up of stereotypes and discrimination, which prevents women and girls from living free. I always say it: We need more education, starting with schools. We must educate our male children to respect the woman's body, her person and her will. This is essential to build a future without wage inequalities, promoting female representation in decision-making places and stopping building everything on a human scale. The European Union must lead by example through further efforts to achieve gender equality by applying the gender mainstreaming and investing adequate resources to close that unbearable gap. But we can't just work for ourselves. We – Europe – have a duty to stand up for all those women in the world who are not even allowed to make their voices heard. We are an army. We will no longer watch in silence. We have lost centuries of equality, but now you will not stop our race.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, we are facing five years in which the fate of Europe will be decided. On the one hand, there are those who want to go back, denying climate change and environmental disasters and thus determining the economic decline and geopolitical irrelevance of Europe in the global context. On the other hand, those who look to a future of economic and social progress, sustainability and technological innovation. The policies of the Green Deal were born from the boys, who asked us, with their peaceful protests, a concrete commitment to guarantee them a fair future also through the modification of those rules, such as unanimity and veto, which limit and slow down our ability to decide. Our duty is to promote investment and research for the transition to a competitive Europe, advanced in technology and innovation and capable of creating quality jobs and new professions. A new specific fund will therefore be needed along the lines of NextGenerationEU, as indicated by Mario Draghi, to bring together environmental and health protection, work and development.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, the Western Balkans are already in Europe: It is evident not only from the geography but from our stories, from the challenges that unite us and from the solutions that we can draw together. Yet, in fact, the situation appears different, stranded in a process of accession that moves in slow motion, if not backwards. We always repeat it: We need a new impetus on the part of the European institutions, not to do anyone a favour, but because enlargement policy is the main instrument for ensuring stability, the rule of law and peace for the Union itself. The Western Balkans need us, just as we need them. But beware: Not at any price. The need for a clear and determined will to be part of our family is evident; If you are a member of the Union, you must respect its values. Violence in political debate, corruption, electoral fraud, spying on journalists and activists and repressive methods of dissent cannot be tolerated. It is necessary to declare with deeds – and not just with words – which side to stand on.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, Commissioner, areas protected from smoking and passive aerosols are essential in the fight against addiction, cancer and non-communicable diseases. They are essential tools to achieve the objectives of the Cancer Plan and to protect public health, in particular of the weakest, such as children and pregnant women. It is crucial that the smoking ban be extended to all open spaces where people gather, but also include new products for smoking, such as e-cigarettes and heated tobacco. These new products are advertised as harmless by the companies that produce them, of course, but they are actually very dangerous for those who use them but also for those close to them. The World Health Organization has clarified the danger of passive aerosols with scientific evidence. Unfortunately, many colleagues on the right, and not only, struggle to accept the scientific evidence: propose dangerous amendments that deny the positions of science and falsely present new products as less dangerous. And this is unacceptable. I find it very worrying that there are parliamentarians ready to deny science to support private, partisan, economic interests. We can make many compromises on many things: But not on people's skin and health. If you want to be taken seriously in the fight against cancer, then don't turn your back on science, on doctors. Ensure the adoption of a text that protects the health of Europeans. Defend science and reject the interference of lobbies of smoking and tobacco. The S&D Group will always be on the side of science and our doctors, patients, citizens. All those who ask us to defend health and protect the weakest, I hope that you will always find us on the sensible side and that this also prevails in the other political groups.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, the regime in Iran continues to intensify its oppression and women pay the highest price for it: clinics to treat women who refuse to wear the hijab properly. This is how the Iranian government works! They call them optional scientific and psychological treatments but we know that there is very little optional in these measures. This is also what happened to Ahoo Daryaei, a student who, after stripping in protest, was labelled as crazy, locked up in a suspected psychiatric hospital and, fortunately, released. These practices not only violate human rights, but use psychiatry as a weapon of repression. The real madness, however, is that of a regime that represses, tortures, kills. The real pathology is also that of the Revolutionary Guards, which, as this Parliament has repeatedly called for, must be included in the list of terrorist organisations in the European Union. We cannot tolerate the struggle for freedom being repressed and raped, as the Iranian regime is carrying out. Ahoo Daryaei and all Iranian women deserve our support and deserve concrete action. Woman, life, freedom!

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, it is not your fault; It's not your skirt's fault. It's not that glass's fault. It's not your fault if you don't love him anymore, if you have a better job than his, if you said yes before but then changed your mind: It is always the fault of those who commit violence and the denunciation should not be seen as a shame. I'm talking to a third of European women. Yes, because one in three has suffered some form of violence. And violence is not just physical violence or femicide, which in Italy has already recorded about 100 victims this year. There are also psychological violence, the control of every action, the deprivation of economic independence: Violence continues to increase, and the majority are already inside our homes. We need a cultural revolution to undermine the patriarchy that still dominates us. We need to teach respect for people's bodies in schools and we need children to learn to accept no, because violence is always the one against consent. Women's violence is a problem for men who must become protagonists of this battle, because a society free from violence, a society free from fear is a better society for all.

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, seven women have already died in Poland as a result of the ban on abortion. Polish law is one of the most restrictive in Europe, a law that not only restricts women's freedom, but heavily affects the duty of doctors to care for people. Criminalizing abortion does not eliminate abortion, but makes it clandestine and dangerous for women. An illegitimate intrusion of politics that recalls a debate these days in which an Italian minister even goes so far as to ask doctors to behave like spies. We all hoped that with the change of government something would change in Poland: It wasn't like that. The right has still disappointed women and girls, who have taken to the streets in Poland and throughout Europe, to remember that everyone must be guaranteed the fundamental right to self-determination. It is not just about health rights, it is about health services, it is about fundamental rights defended in the rule of law. Know that we women will no longer allow you to decide on our bodies.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, according to the World Health Organisation, one in eight people suffers from mental disorders. A situation exacerbated by the pandemic but also by wars and extreme climate effects that also disproportionately affect our young people. The European Health Union must include the Pillar of Rights, in particular the right to state-of-the-art, quality public health for all, including mental health services. This is why we consider the cuts proposed by the Council on the budget for the EU4Health programme unacceptable, when health funds are expected to increase. We call on the next Commission to maintain a high level of focus on health, which is the most valuable asset for the majority of European citizens. This is why I think that one of the battles that we will have to carry out is that of a directive that establishes minimum health services at European level for all, against discrimination and inequalities that are unfortunately still very present.

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, the right to health is a major concern for our citizens. Recently, Europe has approved a reform of the pharmaceutical legislation, but this reform effort cannot be complete without an update of the rules for medical devices. The objectives are common: accessibility, fair prices for all citizens, Europe's strategic autonomy and independence from third countries, the competitiveness of our businesses in the service of public interests. All this requires a public commitment to the research and development of medical devices and products, which does not replace private efforts, but rather supports and complements them. In the last parliamentary term, our group strongly proposed a public research infrastructure, acting in the public interest, which unfortunately was not included in the pharmaceutical package. I ask the Commission to re-evaluate, together with Parliament, this proposal, which can also serve in the field of medical devices, to relaunch an urgent and necessary project for the enjoyment of the right to health for all European citizens.