Speeches

Mr President, recently, the impoverished Greek people have seen their incomes shrink even further as a result of inflation. At this difficult juncture, it was decided to stop buying cheap Russian gas because Russia is attacking Ukraine. Seeing, however, that this gas is being replaced by Azerbaijani gas, I would like to ask you, about Azerbaijan attacking Armenia, why is nothing done? Iran is also being sanctioned for selling offensive drones to Russia. Let us assume that we agree with this decision. In Turkey, which has been selling Bayraktars to Azerbaijanis for so long, why are there no sanctions? We therefore call for an immediate end to this policy of selective humanism. We call for the immediate imposition of sanctions on Turkey.

Madam President, lately Mr Michel has been trying to convene a Mediterranean summit, which will only put Turkey into practice. Let us remind Mr Michel that, as in Europe Finland is famous for its education system, Germany for its industry and France for its culture, Turkey is famous only for its genocides. After it wiped out a third of its Christian population, the Kurds are next. And I want to be a little more specific. On August 19, in the city of Hasaka in northeastern Syria, the UN organized a volleyball match between young girls. A Turkish drone bombed the area where the fight was taking place, killing four little girls. The only mistake these girls made is that they were born Kurdish in a neighborhood that Turkey considers its own. Julius Caesar said that ‘man, by nature, believes what he wants’. So is Europe; They want a "normal" Turkey. So let us remind the European Union that Turkey is not only not "normal", but is a terrorist state and a key funder of ISIS.

Madam President, Prime Minister, thank you very much for your presence. For my part, as a young Greek who is given the floor, I would like to refer to the specific problem of brain drain, a phenomenon of young scientists fleeing abroad to find work and a better future, with of course very negative results for our country. Having recently completed my studies at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, I found that going abroad is an attractive option for 8 out of 10 of my colleagues. Indicatively, during the eight-year period from 2008 to 2016, it is estimated that about half a million young Greek students and graduates left at a cost of about 15 billion euros, according to the National Higher Education Authority. But what is it due to? First, unemployment. According to Eurostat's monthly survey, Greece ranks first in youth unemployment with a rate of more than 30%. We are in the last positions of OECD countries in the employment of young graduates aged 25-34, fourteen percentage points from the average. Second, low wages make it difficult to earn a living. Unfortunately, often young Greeks in order to stay in our country are forced to do something completely different from what they studied. Education is not free. The cost to the Greek state is estimated at 33,000 euros per graduate, but they are eventually used by another country. We can understand that Greece comes out of this situation only damaged. So our young people are forced to leave Greece to find a job well paid for and on what they know and what they studied. Universities, therefore, are not sufficiently interconnected in Greece and the European Union with the labour market. There is no ecosystem that drives young people to try and innovate and, above all, to use their knowledge. As we know, however, work can make our young people truly independent so that they want to stay in Greece – not be customers, but citizens – and, of course, be able to start a family, so that we can tackle the huge demographic problem. So, in addition to not using our outstanding scientists, we must also consider a subsequent problem. This is none other than demographics. Now, for every two adult Greeks, there are about 1.2 children, and we need more than 2 to maintain ourselves as a nation. Our nation, however, is fading and the Greek family is lost. Our young, brilliant minds, excellent scientists and indispensable for our country, must come back. We often see young Greeks in the news innovating, operating and excelling in foreign countries, but we wonder why this is not the case in Greece. In your pre-election speeches, you talked extensively about dealing with the brain drain. Post-election, you defined the root of the problem in universities, and in fact very little was done. So I would like to ask you two main questions on this issue: firstly, whether Greece can bring back all those Greeks who left in the last decade of the crisis and, secondly, how you plan to reverse this phenomenon.

Mr President, according to Eurostat, Greece has 37% youth unemployment. This is linked to the more expensive megawatt-hour costs in Europe, costs that reduce production, are passed on to more expensive goods and are obviously pushing down wages. Provoking unemployment and granting benefits are a modern form of enslavement. With the resulting energy poverty, we are losing another generation. We see the reduction of unemployment as a strategic political objective. With self-respect we must be adaptable to the facts. Coronavirus and new disruptions in supply chains should be a capable factor for brave readjustments of further designs. The non-adjustment of policy to the accumulation of problems is self-obsessed and certainly does not pamper the price of Europe. It approaches social analgesia. Politics usually hides something else behind it. Thousands of citizens live off their lignite mines and ecosystems. There is a clear need for more gradual rehabilitation and a socially more sensitive target than the closure of lignite plants by 2025.

Madam President, a united Europe was created in the ashes of inhuman extremism, the extremism perpetrated by the Holocaust of the Jews inside Europe and which threatened and enslaved states outside it. At the time, many European powers opted for trade instead of early intervention. They chose quiet instead of human life. They chose the policy of appeasement instead of dealing with the monster. So I ask you: Is Turkey or is it not an extremist state? We seem to have a Europe that forgot the lessons it learned in the Second World War, that forgot history and is ready to relive it. According to the prevailing European mentality, Europe would not hesitate to tell Hitler and the Jews to solve the differences between them, as it says more or less to the Greeks and Cypriots who face daily Turkish crime. The policy of equal distances is not just a disgrace, it is a bomb in the foundations of Europe. (Applause)

Mr President, first of all we completely disagree with the use of the name of our Macedonia by Skopje. For us, the debate on this report ends here. The fact that the Skopje call themselves Macedonians is the definition of historical distortion, a distortion that insults every day all Greek citizens and especially the Greeks of our Macedonia. On the basis of the despicable agreement signed by the previous Greek government, which unfortunately the current Greek government adheres to, we lose internationally the right to our name, which is also our soul. For us, as our President, Kyriakos Velopoulos, has stressed, Skopje is prohibited from using the sacred name of our Macedonia in any way. And because this report essentially calls for Skopje's accession to the European Union, we say that Skopje will not enter the European Union unless it is renamed Skopje or Vardarska or anything else that does not offend our history. Therefore, being fully aware of our historical responsibility, we are voting against this report and I invite and invite the other Greek MEPs to do the same.

Madam President, speaking of the common defence policy, there is Joint European Resolution 944 of 2008 against the export of arms to states for internal repression, regional conflicts, but also attacks. In the two-year report of Operation Peace, six cargo ships bound for Libya refused control; All six were Turkish. Turkey invaded Cyprus and was condemned by the UN with decisions enforceable by Europe. After Varosha, the European Parliament called for severe sanctions; sanctions that we have never seen. On the other hand, Italy and Spain accounted for 43% of Turkish arms imports over the past decade. The highlight, of course, is the recent Spanish-Turkish agreement. In 2018 alone, Germany exported 240 million pieces of weapons to Turkey, which also expects five Italian anti-submarine warfare aircraft, a Spanish amphibious assault ship and six German submarines. Obviously, these weapons are intended for use against Greece and Cyprus. How ironic, then, is the debate on a common European defence and the preoccupation with the Ukrainian issue, when the complicity of many here in Turkish crimes is proven?

Mr President, speaking today of our primary sector, we should stop talking about what our farmers should do in order for the Commission to support them and start talking about what the Commission should do in order to support our farmers effectively. In recent years, a disastrous policy has been implemented that has imposed on our producers a series of irrational regulations that have pushed up production costs and, at the same time, dramatically increased imports of agricultural products from third countries. We want to eat olives from Kalamata and not from South Africa, and tomatoes from Crete and not from Turkey. To this end, we have three perfectly workable proposals. Firstly, we call for increased aid and accessibility to our producers; secondly, we call for increased controls on imported agricultural products for pesticide residues and other chemicals that poison European consumers; and thirdly, we call for increased tariffs on imported agricultural products in order to tackle unfair competition against Greeks.

Madam President, it is well known that Turkey is the country that poured oil on the fire in the Middle East. It is the country that has tried in every way to hit Greece even by arming the illegal immigrants. It is therefore hypocritical and outrageous to see the European Union ready to give more money to Turkey, when we know very well that the euros that Erdogan takes turns them into weapons aimed at Greek soldiers. That is why we have two concrete proposals: firstly, that all funding to Turkey be apparently cut off and, secondly, that this money be given to support the Greek port police and the Greek border guards, who guard Thermopylae day and night protecting the Greek and European borders. In closing, I want to say that it should finally be taken for granted that any boat that crosses the Greek border illegally will return to the coast from which it started with its occupants.