What Jiří spoke about.

22

Nov

2023

CS Speech

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The unlawful detention of President Mohamed Bazoum in Niger

Madam President, I want to build on the authors of this proposal. It is right for the European Parliament and the European institutions to stand up for deposed President Bazoum. Indeed, he is a democrat, a man who has promoted the principles of democracy in this difficult tested region of Africa. He was deposed by the military junta, that was clearly stated. He is imprisoned in the palace. However…

22

Nov

2023

CS Speech

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Latest attacks against women and women's rights defenders in Iran, and Iran's arbitrary detention of EU nationals

Madam President, I would like to thank the colleagues who have prepared this resolution, but I would like to point out that the subject of human rights and Iran is regularly discussed here in plenary. Especially in the last parliamentary term, there has often been a debate about whether it is possible to conclude a treaty and cooperate with Iran. It is an atomic research treaty – a nuclear agreeme…

22

Nov

2023

CS Speech

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Revised pollinators initiative - a new deal for pollinators (debate)

Madam President, I listened with interest to today's debate after we unfortunately rejected pesticide restrictions in the morning's vote today. This debate really shows a lot of hopelessness. Commissioner, you can try to support various projects, grants to small and medium-sized farmers, but if there is no radical reduction in pesticides, then we will simply not save pollinators and we will not in…

21

Nov

2023

CS Speech

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Question Time with Commissioners - The state of implementation of the EU’s commitment to provide 1 million rounds of artillery ammunition to Ukraine until March 2024

Madam President, Commissioner, this is a very interesting debate. Let me ask you one more question. Analysts often say that one of the reasons why European armaments don't want to export that much ammunition to Ukraine is because of their trade policy. They have their customers. They are afraid that Ukraine is not a long-term market. I am therefore asking whether the Commission is considering any …

20

Nov

2023

CS Speech

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One-minute speeches on matters of political importance

Mr President, a few days ago, Karel Schwarzenberg, a prominent Czech politician, statesman, a man who helped bring down communism not only in Czechoslovakia, but throughout Central Europe, died. He supported dissidents and then publicly engaged for many years. He was a longtime foreign minister of the Czech Republic. He was also the author of the first Czech Presidency, to whose success he contrib…

20

Nov

2023

CS Speech

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Union certification framework for carbon removals

Mr President, in my short speech, I would also like to support the report that we are discussing and to support the compromise form that has emerged in the relevant committees. And I would like to thank the rapporteur, Mrs Pereira, for the fact that she, her team and the shadow rapporteurs have prepared a text of the proposal that, in my opinion, does not raise any doubts about us adopting unneces…

9

Nov

2023

CS Speech

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System of own resources of the European Union (A9-0295/2023 - José Manuel Fernandes, Valérie Hayer)

Madam President, I did not support this material and it is therefore good to explain why. In short, I am concerned that the proposals for tax redistribution between the European Union and the Member States, with the European Union's revenue boosting, will ultimately lead to an increase in taxes for Europeans, because the Member States will have to somehow increase their revenues in order to be abl…

9

Nov

2023

CS Speech

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Type-approval of motor vehicles and engines with respect to their emissions and battery durability (Euro 7) (A9-0298/2023 - Alexandr Vondra)

Madam President, I was happy to support this compromise. In my opinion, common sense has prevailed and the proposal, on the one hand, protects nature and, on the other hand, preserves the competitiveness of the European automotive industry. The original version presented by the Commission would make smaller and medium-sized cars unaffordable for the middle class and would harm both Europeans, citi…

8

Nov

2023

CS Speech

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One-minute speeches on matters of political importance

Madam President, I wanted to build on the speeches of some of my colleagues who also spoke here today within this bloc about growing anti-Semitism and political extremism in Europe. I think this is a big problem and I wanted to use this one-minute speech to call on all the institutions of the European Union not to really underestimate even the verbal crimes that we have seen recently in the demons…

19

Oct

2023

CS Speech

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European Citizens' Initiative 'Fur Free Europe' (debate)

Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, I am honoured to speak in this debate. I personally consider it extremely important that today we are debating a possible ban on fur farms in the European Union. In fact, more than half of the countries in the European Union have already adopted such a ban. My country, the Czech Republic, adopted this ban in 2017 and has been in force since 2019. I had the ho…

18

Oct

2023

CS Speech

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Schengen area: digitalisation of the visa procedure (A9-0025/2023 - Matjaž Nemec)

Mr President, I will be very brief here. I consider the issue of Schengen to be one of the clear priorities and advantages of the European Union. Whenever I explain the advantages of European integration in my country and I feel that the people there are not very attuned to European integration, the issue of Schengen and the abolition of internal borders is a topic that everyone perceives positive…

18

Oct

2023

CS Speech

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2022 Report on Montenegro (A9-0277/2023 - Tonino Picula)

Mr President, I supported this report. Despite the problems that this report describes in relation to Montenegro in the areas of justice and the constitutional court, the functioning of the political system and the disputes that prevail among representatives of public authority there, I think it is important for Montenegro to be a member of the European Union in the long term, especially for geopo…

18

Oct

2023

CS Speech

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General budget of the European Union for the financial year 2024 - all sections (A9-0288/2023 - Siegfried Mureşan, Nils Ušakovs)

Mr President, I supported this report and I consider it important, but I wanted to add that I consider the current issues of financing the Palestinian Authority to be particularly important, where I supported those amendments which clearly state that the financing of the Palestinian Authority is to be suspended at least until such funds are verified, before the Palestinian Authority clearly condem…

18

Oct

2023

CS Speech

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New European innovation agenda (debate)

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, Commissioner, let me make a few remarks on this very important subject. The theme of innovation is a key theme for the future of Europe. I'm not as optimistic as some of my colleagues. Unfortunately, I think we lag a bit behind the United States of America or some Asian countries, such as South Korea, in innovation. We are giving a smaller percentage of innovati…

18

Oct

2023

CS Speech

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Mental health at work (debate)

Madam President, this has been a very interesting debate. In principle, all colleagues here agreed on the importance of mental health, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. And I think it is a clear signal from Parliament, a clear call to the Commission to address this issue, in the legislative field – there have been a number of proposals that I would sign for mental health diseases to be incl…

17

Oct

2023

CS Speech

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2022 Report on Montenegro (debate)

Madam President, I wanted to support the report. I think it's very well written. I am particularly interested in passages in the field of justice. I consider the warning that the constitutional judiciary in Montenegro is not functioning, the court is not fulfilled, etc. to be a very precise part of this report. The report is factual, correct, and reasonably critical. On the other hand, I want to e…

16

Oct

2023

CS Speech

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One-minute speeches on matters of political importance

Madam President, I wanted to draw attention to a subject that I think is particularly important, and that is the subject of legislation that protects animals. I must say that in my country, the Czech Republic, the animal protection community was very frightened and surprised by the statements made by Mr Šefčovič, a Member of the Commission, who questioned the Commission's commitment that a package…

5

Oct

2023

CS Speech

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The new European strategy for a better internet for kids (BIK+) (B9-0386/2023)

Mr President, I supported this strategy for a better internet for children. However, I note that, in addition to the strategy, concrete steps will then need to be developed. For example, I am very interested in the topic of abuse of social networks of the Internet to the detriment of children, sexual abuse of children in the online space. And here I would like to point out that a new piece of legi…

5

Oct

2023

CS Speech

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Taking stock of Moldova's path to the EU (B9-0407/2023, RC-B9-0408/2023, B9-0408/2023, B9-0410/2023, B9-0411/2023, B9-0417/2023, B9-0420/2023)

Mr President, I would like to comment on Moldova, which was the subject of the vote. I am happy to support this, but I want to make a public appeal here, so that we do not really take this as a formal matter of negotiating the approximation of Moldova to the European Union. And we should really have a realistic scenario of how in the next ten years this country could join the EU, because if we onl…

5

Oct

2023

CS Speech

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Situation in Nagorno-Karabakh after Azerbaijan’s attack and the continuing threats against Armenia (B9-0405/2023, RC-B9-0393/2023, B9-0393/2023, B9-0397/2023, B9-0399/2023, B9-0400/2023, B9-0402/2023, B9-0404/2023)

Mr President, I supported the resolution. Azerbaijan's behaviour is a scandalous violation of international law. Attack on Nagorno-Karabakh. It is necessary to consider how to help Armenia, which unfortunately is abandoned today and that help is minimal, let's face it. Similarly, it must be said that one must condemn Russia’s position, which gave the impression that it was trying to maintain peace…

5

Oct

2023

CS Speech

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Poor sanitary conditions, low levels of security and lack of parking places in rest areas for truck drivers (debate)

Mr President, the debate has been very interesting and shows the case where, on the one hand, we are adopting legislation that, for example, improves the working conditions of certain workers, the need to sleep in hotels, shortens the period during which a truck driver has to drive, but, on the other hand, we are doing nothing to make these rules workable, so that they are real rules. And that see…

4

Oct

2023

CS Speech

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Human rights situation in Afghanistan, in particular the persecution of former government officials

Mr President, I wanted to thank the rapporteurs for this resolution tabled, and I want to support it publicly here. The situation in Afghanistan is catastrophic. The Taliban has broken all the promises and commitments they have made to both the domestic and international community, and we must respond to that. The authors of the resolution described in detail how human rights, the rights of politi…

4

Oct

2023

CS Speech

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The spread of ‘anti-LGBTIQ’ propaganda bills by populist parties and governments in Europe (debate)

Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, let me also say a few sentences on this subject that I consider important. I was surprised, some colleagues here said that the topic is not important, there are more important topics. I'm not going to judge. But when it comes to human rights, it's always an important issue. Human rights are the foundation of the values of European integration and we should treat…

4

Oct

2023

CS Speech

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Energy Charter Treaty: next steps (debate)

Madam President, the debate on the fate of the Energy Charter is precisely an example of how sometimes compromise between the different EU institutions is difficult to find. I respect the adoption last November of the European Parliament's position that this multilateral international convention should be abandoned on the basis of a Commission decision. On the other hand, I will not deny that at t…

4

Oct

2023

CS Speech

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The proposed extension of glyphosate in the EU (debate)

Madam President, the debate clearly shows that there are two public interests at stake here. On the one hand, the public interest in agricultural production, on the other hand, the interest in protecting our health, nature, biodiversity. Personally, I am inclined not to use or prolong the use of this substance, because even though doubts have been expressed in the debate that is taking place here …