Speeches

Madam President, Commissioner, colleagues, in 1991 I was fifteen years old, and my mother made the non-choice to send me with a smuggler to Europe because it was so expensive for us both to come to Europe. There were no legal pathways. She could not come here to work, though she has a master's degree in economics. My father was imprisoned in Abu Ghraib in Iraq for eleven years because he and my mum dared to question Saddam, dared to fight for freedom. That's why the entire family had a death sentence. These are the migrants who you want to punish, who you say are criminals. I hear Mr Leggeri and his friends calling for harder punishment. Yes, please do that, we all agree: harder punishment on the smugglers. But why punish the migrants? Why always calling them, putting them in the narrative of being criminals. It is not true. The report they are referring to – is it the UNHCR 2025 Global Appeal, where they say that there is a rise of 106 % of forcibly displaced persons, or 60 million women, who are at high risk of being subject to gender inequality? We are just treating the symptoms. When you talk about harder punishment and not the root causes, we have to have a comprehensive approach to migration. We have to build more legal pathways to the EU.

Mr President, Mr Commissioner, dear colleagues, the ongoing violence in Sudan and senseless war has gripped the nation and its people by suffering, displacement and fear. The status quo for almost two years now has been that of utter devastation and no one is safe. People are slaughtered on a daily basis, facing famine on a daily basis, fleeing on a daily basis. Women, men, children, mutilated, raped and abused. But let's not be mistaken. This conflict is entirely manmade. On purpose. Further fuelled by outside influences due to greed and power politics, limited aid is entering. Because of that, our role as a European Union is to put pressure on regional powers for sustainable, long-lasting peace and provide necessary humanitarian aid. Too long we have been quiet, too long we have sought to withdraw our engagement from the region? Too long we have idly stood by while millions of people are displaced, thousands of them are killed. Just how much longer can we wait? The EU must show leadership!

Mr President, for 470 days, the laughter of the children on the streets of Gaza have been replaced by bombs. Netanyahu has mass murdered over 40 000 Palestinians, leading to an arrest warrant by the ICC. But now we have a ceasefire that is very much welcome, leading to silencing the weapons – loved ones, both hostages and detainees coming home to their families. This ceasefire must become a sustainable peace. Netanyahu and his extremist government must understand that if it's peace and security they want for the Israeli people, then they should not be bombing Palestinians or the neighbouring countries. If it's peace and security Netanyahu wants for the Israeli people, it is by fulfilling the human rights of the Palestinian people. If it's peace and security Netanyahu and the Knesset want to build for the Israeli people, it is by stopping the ban on UNRWA. UNRWA is the only trusted and respected international organisation by the Palestinians, both in Gaza, the West Bank and the occupied territories. The needs of education for children and healthcare are overwhelming – it will take more than 350 years to rebuild Gaza. Netanyahu, you have 11 days to find a solution. And if the EU will do one thing right, it is to keep the pressure on Netanyahu to lift the ban on UNRWA.

I have two questions: you said that there are over 1 000 Palestinian criminals. Are you aware that these people are arbitrarily detained without a trial? There is no proof of being tried and there are several of them who are under the age of 18 who are now being finally released. My second question is, would you condemn the Knesset members who are saying that Palestinians are animals and do not deserve human rights, as you are condemning the so-called brainwashing of Palestinian children?

Mr President, Madam Commissioner, here comes another type of feminist, that is a characteristic apparently. End all forms of discrimination against women, eliminate all violence against women in private life and in public life. Stop practices like child marriage and female genital mutilation. Women's full participation and equal opportunities for leadership at all levels in society. Universal access to sexual and reproductive health and rights. Equal rights to economic resources. Ownership of land and property. Enforceable legislation for promoting equality and empowerment of girls and women everywhere. This is SDG 5, and with today's pace, it will take us 286 years to achieve. Really, are we on track to achieve this goal? Is this House prepared to do everything to achieve the SDG 5? Is the political landscape here, and I'm asking the far right and the conservatives, really conducive for achieving SDG 5? One clear thing is that with the rise of the far right and conservatism in general in our societies, we know that the attacks on women's and girls' rights, they are coming well-organised, well-coordinated and well-financed, and it is a very good question to ask: where does the money come from? So this puts a very special responsibility on our shoulders. We have to work together, we have to stand united against the oppression of women, because we owe it to the women without voices, to the girls without voices, and because if not us, then who? And if not now, then when? Merry Christmas and a happy new year.

Madam President, I would like to thank you for your We are certainly making progress on the rights of people with disabilities. But is that enough? That is the question. The figures speak for themselves very clearly. Over-representation in unemployment, over-representation in unfinished education, exposure to violence and crime and, not least, de-prioritisation in health care. We saw this during the COVID-19 pandemic, with people with disabilities at the bottom of the list of life-saving interventions. And there is not a single Member State that is not criticised by the UN and the CRPD for not living up to what we have promised. Not even my own country, Sweden. whereas people with disabilities still live today without access to education, work, leisure and free movement and, most importantly, political participation; And do not think anywhere that we are in any way extra good when we live up to our own commitments. We are paying off a political debt because we have consistently created a society that is not accessible to all our citizens. We cannot update this strategy without the participation of the group.

Mr President, dear Commissioner, as a woman working on gender equality, sexual and reproductive health and rights, I am too aware that the political environment can be very toxic, full of harassment and hate. Today I met Georgian parliamentarian who is also attending the debate tonight, Ana Natsvlishvili. She spoke to me about the horrifying reality of being a woman in politics in Georgia since the democratic crackdown in the country. She told me about how she and female members of the parliament, when debating the Russian law, they went to work with pepper spray in their handbags because they were worried for their own safety. Imagine going to work in a house of democracy, not feeling safe. Imagine, during a plenary debate, your male colleagues shouting at you filthy names and calling you filthy things. Imagine security dragging you out from a meeting inside the parliament where you are elected. Of course, the people of Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine, they are fighting for Europe. The people of Georgia, Moldova, Ukraine and the Western Balkans, they belong to our common European future, and we have to do everything to ensure that they will become part of this future. But that future means also that everyone, each of these countries have to fully embrace the fundamental rights that we have in common. They have to also fully agree to and embrace that their accession means that everyone is equal and free, because if not, we are not free until everyone is free.

Madam President, Madam High Representative, dear colleagues, I would like to ask you, Madam High Representative, to actually initiate a global initiative against weaponising of rape as a tool of war against women. Let us be taking the lead on this issue, because we all know the fact that women in Sudan are raped by different militias. We know that as a fact – we know that they are treated with no human dignity. We know that there are gang rapes against them. We know that girls are being treated the same way. We know that in the DRC, women have been suffering from sexual violence for such a long time, and still we are debating this over and over again. We have the tools, but no one is willing to actually do the job. I do believe that you have the stamina, you have the competence, but also the the legitimacy to actually take this initiative globally and lead the world against the weaponisation of rape against women, because this is totally not acceptable for our standards, for our world. These women, they deserve to live a life in safety. They deserve to live a life in dignity. They deserve to have their whole bodies whole and not used as a tool of war.

Madam President, in four of the EU's Member States, it is still legal to hit your child. Children with a disability are still living in inaccessible societies, excluding them from school, sport or, you know, just a normal, interesting free time. And still, we have Member States that do not allow for children to access and inherit their parents' citizenship because their parents belong to the same sex. So, the new Commission will have a lot to do when it comes to the issue of children's rights. We are not done, even if we have for 35 years been talking about children's rights and the Convention of the Rights of the Child. But we cannot talk about the convention about the rights of the child without also addressing the situation in Gaza and the horrendous amount of children who have been killed. It is time to discharge the Association Agreement with Israel, to adhere to the ICC decision of the arrest warrant and it is time to actually treat all children equally.

Madam President, her name is Mahsa Jina Amini. Her name is Nasrin Sotoudeh. Her name is Ahoo Daryaei. Her name is the fight. The fight for every woman in Iran. Two years ago, I stood here in the plenary trying to echo the message of these women, and two years later, I stand here once more. The situation is even worsening. Women are no longer only facing arbitrary detention, torture and abuse, but also declaration of insanity by the Iranian regime. Women and their right to peaceful, free and equal life is completely discredited, delegitimized and cast aside by the words of lesser men. Women and their rights, when they fight for that, they are declared insane. These lesser men are afraid because by declaring these women insane, they are depriving them from the right to a just trial where their words would be a fight, a show, a proof of the struggle for the existential rights. They are afraid, these men, because two years later, despite all tools of repression, the struggle continues and the fire and the Iranian women's hearts remain alit. Let us continue the fight. Let us continue to raise the voices of every woman in Iran, Farsi, Azeri, Kurdish, Baháʼí, Armenian, and make the Iranian regime understand that the women of the world will never stop until every woman in Iran is free. Jin, Jiyan, Azadî. Woman, life, freedom. Now, tomorrow and as long as it takes.

Madam President, I would like to thank you for your I have to say that I am amazed at the amount of "hit-on" laws that Viktor Orbán o. co. can invent to discriminate against LGBTIQ people and their rights. At first, women did not give birth to enough children. Well, what's the answer? Yes, to limit rainbow families. Then it was unnatural, immoral, even unpatriotic to love someone of the same sex. And what's the answer? Discriminating against LGBTIQ people. And now the last: We're here to protect the children. And what's the answer? Ding, ding, ding, ding – removing all LGBTIQ expressions from public space. What is it really, this obsession with this particular group of people? First, words such as ‘protect’, ‘protect’, ‘defend’ – all positive words. But it all boils down to discriminating against people belonging to the LGBTIQ community – something that the whole EU stands up to, united. No to discrimination, we have said over and over again. Therefore, this constant downgrading of the human rights and freedoms of LGBTIQ people in Hungary must be stopped, and now. Viktor Orbán o. co. must be held accountable.

Thank you for this speech that did not say anything about ending the violence against women. I just wanted you to clarify here, did you just compare animal welfare with gender-based violence? Is that your purpose?

Mr President, every time we stand here to mark the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women is proof of our collective failure. Because even when we say that all girls and women deserve a life free from violence, we still do not have, for all women in the EU, access to legal and safe abortion. Still today, we do not have a European common definition of rape. This is here today. But if we look few centuries ago, men used to burn women who were not comfortable in societies. Today, in Iran, women are declared insane because they fight for their human rights by men. Women are raped as part of wars and armed conflicts everywhere by men. Women are killed in their very own homes by men. Women are educating themselves, working hard, but are being outrun in the salaries by men. They say not all men, but all women. It's time for all men to end violence against women.

Mr President, Madam Commissioner, esteemed colleagues, state control over her body, state control over her health, state control over her own choices. The ban on abortion in Poland has led to a lethal outcome for many women in Poland. One year has passed since the government change, a change that was led by the young people of Poland, by the women in Poland, and nothing has happened yet. Thousands of women are forced to flee the country over the Polish border so they can perform abortion. Others are forced to undergo illegal, unsafe and in many aspects also lethal abortions. In Poland, thanks to the anti-gender movement and political parties, together with the religious establishment, it is the state that is exercising violence against women. The Polish abortion ban is nothing else but a ruthless, cruel violence against women. It is time for change. It is time for women in Poland to own their own choices. They have the right to their own bodies.

I maybe do not see the conflict in your question or the big issue in your question. I do believe that what we are differing in is 'how do we do it?' Nobody here is defending the overstay of everyone here. No one is defending that. What we are talking about is: how do we make people return? How do we enable them actually to have a life in dignity when they go back home? How do we make their countries of origin receive them? And how do we make sure that these people are not in a limbo where nobody wants them and their lives are put on hold?

Madam President, I would like to thank you for your There seems to be a misunderstanding here in the debate that the house is divided in terms of repatriation. What we didn't agree on here, that's how It's going to happen. Resettlement without taking into account the possibilities for the returnee to be reintegrated is not the answer. Resettlement without taking into account the conditions in the receiving countries is not the answer. Remigration without a focus on the needs of the individual human situation, the people behind the statistics, is not the answer. Replying constantly to "send back" is not the answer. The answer, however, is the migration pact. Safe and legal pathways must be at the core of the European migration policy, which is always based on respect for human rights and guaranteeing human security. Our only response can't be to send it back. Return must be part of a framework. Return must be a part, a piece of the puzzle, of our migration as a whole.

Madam President, dear colleagues, over three years ago, we actually voted in this Parliament to allow some resolutions on foreign affairs to be translated into non-EU languages. We decided to go for the UN languages, namely, besides the coverage that we already have with our own EU languages, it is Mandarin, Russian and Arabic. Still, three years after this date, we have already hired translators who are doing excellent job in translating into these languages. But, still the translated texts, the translated resolutions, are not uploaded onto our website of the European Parliament. The purpose was to reach out as a European Parliament to more people, to more actors. Still, for example, we have the resolution on Iraq today, which is already translated to Arabic, and I have already been in contact with NGOs. In my naivety, I thought that the text was already uploaded to our website, but not. So I had to send it by myself. I would kindly ask you to remind the Secretary-General of this House to actually give the order for the uploading of our work to the already decided languages.

Madam President, I would like to thank you for your Religious intolerance is increasing in our Union, as well as in the rest of the world. Last week, I stood here talking about the rise of anti-Semitism and Islamophobia, two phenomena that poison public discourse but also make the lives of so many so difficult and unbearable: an anti-Semitism that we thought we had resisted and learned our lesson from the Second World War, Islamophobia that we have said is not compatible with a functioning democracy. Damn, we're here discussing this. We have a lot of tools in our toolbox, with DSA and DMA and AI Act, as regards the digital sphere. But in the political sphere, what do we do about it? We have representatives in this house who are openly propagating precisely this kind of intolerance, this kind of hatred. They use Parliament as their arena to spread their hatred, and we must always resist this clearly in all our ranks. The EU is a union of democracies, based on the principle of the equal right and value of all people. No one should rely on their own religion to spread hatred and threats against others. Women should not have to die because religious fundamentalists want to ban abortion. In my Europe, it is democracy and the law that lead society, not Bible-controlled priests, medieval mullahs or xenophobic Nazis. No one is free from oppression until we are all free.

Madam President, Commissioner, 'The time of the concubines is over. Women are no longer slaves.' These are the words chanted by the women of Iraq on the streets of every Iraqi city. In 2004, there was the first attempt to implement this law and it was stopped at that time. But now, 20 years later, this law has come back to haunt the girls and women in Iraq. This anti-women agenda is driven by the Shia Muslim political parties. We know that. But now it has also gotten the approval of the Sunni Muslim parties and the Kurdish parties because they have been promised their fair share of the cake of the legislation. And we know exactly what kind of legislation they are they're wanting. If this new law passes, nine-year-old girls could be legally married – and this in a country where domestic violence is not criminalised. This rolling-back of women's rights is shameful. And we from the European Parliament urge the Iraqi Parliament to start listening to the judicial experts, to civil society and stop this proposal of amending the civil law in Iraq.

Madam President, the EU must stop the association agreement with Netanyahu and his extremist government right now. There is no other solution right now than ceasefire. We cannot pray for peace while arming one side in this war. Nobody has ever managed to bomb their way to peace, to justice, to security, to dignity. It is simply not possible to bring security and safety through the indiscriminate killing of civilians. And it is important that people start to feel safe so they can return home across the region. The escalation we see in the Middle East is dangerous, not only for the region, where it risks escalating into a wider war, but also for us here in the EU. And if Netanyahu can't see that, while he is still killing children, women and innocent people – now not only in Gaza and the West Bank but also in Lebanon – we have to use every last leverage we have as a union to make him stop. Peace and ceasefire now.

Mr President, I would like to thank you. Madam Commissioner, I would like to thank you for your In April, we in the EU approved the first legislation on violence against women – only in 2024. One in three women in the EU has experienced physical or sexual violence – one in three. However, we were unable to include a European definition of rape or a requirement for consent, something that I and the Centre Women have worked tirelessly for. whereas gender-based violence is a systemic problem and requires a systemic solution, one in which the security and rights of all women are enshrined in the founding charter of our fundamental human rights; Yet we are held back by some in this house, and the question is how the biggest group will behave, if you choose to be a doormat for the right-wing populists and let backwards into the game. We have a Commission coming in, but what do we see? Where is the Commissioner for Equality? It is treated as something that is lagging behind. We have a responsibility in this Union and in this House to do better for all European citizens – now, and it has been a very, very long time. Thank you very much, Dalli, for all the work you have done, both for gender equality and for people with disabilities. Thank you so much and good luck in the future!

I would like to ask my esteemed colleague. I mean, he is really passionate about the women who have been killed, who have been raped by so-called gangs from the outside of other cultures and all of that, that he said – pretty much very racist. Do you feel as passionate about the men from your own country who rape, kill and abuse women? Should we also kick them out? And do you make the estimate that Viktor Orbán is not equally as dangerous for our cooperation, our security as any threat from the outside, because he is being Vladimir Putin's little boy here inside the EU?

Mr President, I would like to thank you. Madam Commissioner, I would like to thank you for your Viktor Orbán has repeatedly challenged the EU through his political decisions. He has blindly ignored our fundamental principles and openly demonstrated his role as Putin's megaphone and little errand boy in the Council and in the EU. He has clearly shown his contempt for everything the EU stands for. But he has been good at taking our taxpayers' money for his suspicious projects. By opening the doors to Russians and Belarusians, by threatening the instrumentalisation of the situation of Ukrainian refugees, Mr Orbán is violating the objectives and principles of Schengen and, above all, the principle of the free movement of our citizens. It is unacceptable and directly dangerous. This is an act of sheer lawlessness that undermines what we in this House stand for, what our citizens voted for right now in this last European elections. Orbán’s actions create divisions within the EU and reduce trust between Member States and trust in Schengen. It is important that we remain united, that we continue to protect the principles on which this cooperation is based. It is important that we protect both the Schengen system, our principles of solidarity and our cooperation. But most important of all is to raise this issue so that Hungarian citizens are told that this is happening in their country. Because they don't know that they are the ones who will suffer from this. It is important to hold Viktor Orban to account now.

Madam President, Commissioner, esteemed colleagues, it is very interesting that a government that is defined as democratic by the white Europeans actually has been given carte blanche to kill as many as possible. And still we call it a democracy respecting human rights. Two days ago, a document with 649 pages was released with the names, the ages, the ID numbers and the genders of the people who have been killed since 7 October in just Gaza. Fourteen pages were filled with names of children who had not reached the age of one year, and none of these children had a gun in their hand. And still you are discussing and saying Hamas and Israeli self-defence. To date we have over 40 000 people who have been killed in Gaza. Despite this, some groups of this House had the audacity to remove the term 'ceasefire' from the title from this debate. I mean, this is showing the ugliness of our double standards here in the EU. And we still allow for weapons to go to Israel. The same government led by Netanyahu and his far-right extremist government that are facing arrest warrants from the International Criminal Court. It is the same government that has flagrantly disregarded international law and the rulings of the International Court of Justice. We must call for a ceasefire now. We must end the killings of the Palestinians now.

Mr President, madam Commissioner, esteemed colleagues, racism is racism, is racism. Our Jewish citizens are encouraged to fear their Muslim neighbours by extremists. Our Muslim citizens are encouraged to hate their Jewish neighbours by other types of extremists. The Jewish and Muslim minorities have more in common than ever possibly can divide us. If we sanction one kind of racism and hate and let it roam freely in the EU, it will not take long time before it comes back and turns to another minority. Over 80 % of European Jews, our Jewish Europeans, think and feel that political leadership, that our governments, are not doing enough to face on combat anti-Semitism. Many Muslims feel that they are living in a dystopia, where they are blamed for everything that went wrong with politics in our countries. Instrumentalisation of racism will not make anyone feel more safe. It is very dangerous because this will cost us our unity and our sense of community as Europeans. But most dangerously, this will cost us our belief in democracy as we know it. Now it's high time to show some backbone and to not normalise the extremists and their opinions. It's when we let them in into the political fine rooms that they can normalise and make hate the new normal.