Speeches

The next meeting will take place tomorrow, Wednesday 10 May 2023 at 9 a.m. The agenda has been published and is available on the European Parliament's website.

Madam President, Welcome, Chancellor! The world is in a state of upheaval. You have coined the word "Zeitwende" for this, and we must also actively shape it as a European Union. For us as Social Democrats, it is crucial: This transition must be just; We need a just transition. This applies internally: We must make the transition socially just, for the people of all the Member States to which we are committed, and responsible for this planet. And we have to see them now. Climate change is in full swing. But also to the outside. I am very grateful for the comments on the Western Balkans, on relations with Africa and South America. We must not repeat the mistakes of the past. We want relationships on an equal footing. We want one Global Just TransitionA global just transition. And I thank you for saying that my home country is making a strong contribution to this.

The next item on the agenda is the joint debate on – the report by Stefan Berger, on behalf of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, on the proposal for a regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on markets in crypto-assets and amending Directive (EU) 2019/1937 (COM(2020)0593 – C9-0306/2020 – 2020/0265(COD)) (A9 0052/2022) and – the report by Ernest Urtasun, on behalf of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, and Assita Kanko, on behalf of the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs, on the proposal for a regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on information accompanying transfers of funds and certain crypto-assets (recast) (COM(2021)0422 – C9 0341/2021 – 2021/0241 (COD)) (A9-0081/2022).

The next item on the agenda is Question Time with questions to the Commission (Rule 137). I welcome Commissioner Gabriel to this Question Time. The theme of this Question Time is: “Results of the European Year of Youth”. I have to give you some information in advance, which had already gone to the political groups. The question time will last about 90 minutes, and the speaking time will be one minute for one question and two minutes for the answer, as before. However, following the discussions in the working group on the reform of Parliament, a new format for Question Time is to be tested today. In order for more colleagues to be able to take the floor, additional questions of 30 seconds can only be asked during the first round of speakers. After that, it remains with the one question. It also remains the case that the possible additional question in this first round must be directly related to the main question and must not include a new question. So if you would like to ask a question, I would ask you – as you may have already done – to register your request now by using the function of your voting device for spontaneous interventions after inserting your voting card. During Question Time, interventions will be made from your seat and I ask all speakers to respect the speaking time allocated to them so that as many colleagues as possible can speak.

The next item on the agenda is the debate on the Commission statement on the adoption of the proposals for the Cyber Package (2023/2651(RSP)).

The minutes of yesterday's meeting and the texts adopted are available. Are there any objections to the minutes? That is not the case. The minutes have thus been approved.

We'll record this. As far as I am aware, the Conference of Presidents has already dealt with this incident and will inform you about the further procedure.

The debate is thus closed. A motion for a resolution was tabled at the end of the debate. The vote will take place today, Thursday 16 February 2023. The session was interrupted for a few minutes. It will resume at 12.00 with the vote. (The meeting adjourned at 11.36)

Thank you very much, Madam President, also for your patience to wait for several hours on this exceptional day – six hours. Thank you very much also to Commissioner McGuinness, who has the floor now.

The next item on the agenda is the debate on the report by Rasmus Andresen, on behalf of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, on the European Central Bank – Annual Report 2022 (2022/2037(INI)) (A9-0022/2023).

I have five applications, two of which, however, have already spoken in the debate. That's why I'm going to consider three. Spontaneous interventions

Mr President, the situation of the rule of law in Greece has been deteriorating in recent times, and I found the report by the Commissioner really alarming. I mean, her having to remind a government to secure physical safety of journalists. This should really silence any critics about the critics, you know. And the most obvious issue you see it is media freedom. In the 2022 World Press Freedom Index by Reporters Without Borders, Greece marked the 108th country. And of course, the last country in Europe. And the most disturbing event probably was the murder of the investigative journalist Giorgos Karaivaz in April 2021. In almost two years, that has been close to no progress in the investigations. And in the last months, it turned out that at least 13 Greek journalists have been targeted by the spyware Predator. One of them covered the introduction of laws by the Mitsotakis government, impeding the prosecution of money laundering and other financial wrongdoing. Now you have to know that Predator and Pegasus are not just spyware. It is as if someone had your mobile phone in their hands. They can manipulate everything you do on your phone. They can listen to everything you do. They can switch on the camera whenever they want to. This is a very serious breach of privacy rights. And within the Pegasus inquiry committee, we were shocked to learn about the large scale of political use of this spyware in Greece, besides the use against investigative journalists. Also the opposition leader Nikos Androulakis, Member of this parliament, and other politicians were spied upon. And all of this, the use of this wide-ranging spying software without ex ante judicial authorisation, ex post oversight and meaningful legal remedy is a clear breach of our union's fundamental rights. But it is not this alone. Moreover, we discovered close ties between the government and the company Intelexa that is selling this spy software Predator. It is a script that could be written in any textbook on corruption. Until last summer, the nephew of the Prime Minister, Mitsotakis, was his secretary-general/head of cabinet in his office. He was responsible for government contacts with the national intelligence service. Moreover, two friends of this nephew, Bitzios and Lavranos, happened to be key figures in the supply for communications surveillance material and both benefited from lucrative government contracts. The nephew had to resign, as well as the director of the intelligence service. Now, elections have been called in Greece. This makes it even more urgent to end the illegal spying on journalists, as well as on opposition politicians or politicians in general. Greece is the birthplace of democracy. The current situation is a disgrace for this beautiful country. This mess needs to be cleaned up and it needs to be cleaned up now.

The next item on the agenda is the debate on the statement by the Vice-President of the Commission / High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy on the situation in Afghanistan (2023/2533(RSP)).

The next item on the agenda is the debate on the statements by the Council and the Commission on the need for a prompt update of the EU list of high-risk third countries for the purpose of combating money laundering and terrorist financing (2023/2532(RSP)).