What Cyrus spoke about.

23 Nov

2023

EN Speech

International day for the elimination of violence against women (debate)

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Mr President, I am glad that finally we have ratified the Istanbul Convention as a European Union. But I ask myself: why did it have to take so long when our values are so clearly enshrined in our Treaty? But the Istanbul Convention alone is not enough. This week in Malta, in my country, we remembered the murder of Bernice Cassar last year, murdered by her former husband. The Istanbul Convention a…

22 Nov

2023

EN Speech

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

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Madam President, thank you, Commissioner, for being here with us at this late hour. This has not been a very good day for pollinators in our Parliament. It hasn’t been a good day for nature or our health, as those who oppose their protection managed to kill the law to have ambitious targets on the use of harmful and toxic pesticides. This means that pollinators will continue being killed and, unfo…

21 Nov

2023

EN Speech

Proposals of the European Parliament for the amendment of the Treaties (debate)

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Mr President, what is the current situation? A European Union that is paralysed. A Union that takes more than eight years to decide on simple migration policy, not to leave countries at the periphery alone and saving lives. Let us look a bit at the current crisis. On the one hand, we have a Union that is absent on deciding and many times agrees only on the lowest common denominator, leaving a big …

21 Nov

2023

EN Speech

Implementation of the principle of the primacy of EU law (A9-0341/2023 - Yana Toom, Cyrus Engerer) (vote)

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Mr President, colleagues, imagine our continent without the unifying force of the European Union. This is what we are voting on today. It is not just a hypothetical scenario: we have multiple actors within and outside of our Union, working each day to dismantle this beautiful project that our foreparents dreamed of, built, and with which we have now been entrusted by our citizens, in our hands, to…

21 Nov

2023

MT Speech

Strengthening the CO2 emission performance targets for new heavy-duty vehicles (debate)

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Mr President, whether we are in the car or on a pavement and passing a truck, crane or, in the past, a bus near us and literally fills us with smoke, so much so that we cannot even breathe. Harm to our health and damage to the environment and the climate. Just think about this, 25% of the traffic emissions come from these large vehicles, but these vehicles are only 2% of all vehicles on our roads.…

19 Oct

2023

EN Speech

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

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Madam President, what a strong tool we have given European citizens to directly participate in European democracy. Yet the Commission simply ignores. This is the tenth successful citizens’ initiative and, Madam Commissioner, it’s the fourth one in which so many citizens – 1.5 million – are asking us to legislate on animal welfare. This time, citizens are telling us that, as consumers, they do not …

18 Oct

2023

EN Question

Rule of Law in Malta: 6 years after the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia and the need to protect journalists (debate)

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Thank you, Madam President, and I listened attentively also to the reply to my colleague Daniel Freund. However, Mr Rangel, you haven’t said, do you condemn what happened in Greece? How did you vote? You mentioned your voting: how did you vote and how did your party, your group vote here in Parliament when it came to condemning Greece on the scandal where the EPP Government was wiretapping a numbe…

18 Oct

2023

MT Speech

Rule of Law in Malta: 6 years after the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia and the need to protect journalists (debate)

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Ms President, the Maltese and Gozitans were saddened by our country's political system based on mud throwing. A system of two tribes where everything is white or black and where critical thinking is thrown out of the window. And we experienced it and exported it from our country and brought it to the European Parliament at least once a year. Because as my friends Sophie, Gwendoline and Konstantino…

18 Oct

2023

MT Speech

Outcome of the SDGs Summit (18-19 September 2023, New York) – transformative and accelerated actions leading up to 2030 and beyond (debate)

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Ms President, on the environment, action must be now or never. This is the message we heard from scientists, experts, academics and all those working to protect the environment and fight climate change when we were New York for the UN forum. We know that 80% of the targets for sustainable development will not be met simply because we will not cope with climate change and biodiversity loss in the w…

18 Oct

2023

EN Speech

A true geopolitical Europe now (topical debate)

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Madam President, the time is now. We have three wars on our borders and the European voice is fragmented. Our decision-making process leads us to be fragmented and agree only on the lowest common denominator, and then it leads our presidents to act unilaterally, without mandates to act, as we have seen recently also in Israel. We have seen, as history shows us even recently, that we are so much st…

4 Oct

2023

EN Speech

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

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Mr President, I would stand here and call out the names of those Italian Government members of parliament who proposed an amendment to ban LGBTIQ+ content from being shown on public television in Italy. But that would give them the populist promotion that they so avidly seek. So I will instead call out the names of young people who are no longer with us, because when they realised that they were d…

4 Oct

2023

MT Speech

Need for a speedy adoption of the asylum and migration package (debate)

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Mr President, do I talk to many people in our squares and streets in Malta and other European countries, and do you know what they say? On immigration, Europe has failed. Do I talk to immigrants in detention centres or in open ones, and do you know what they also say? On immigration, Europe has failed. As many of us said here in this Parliament this morning, on immigration, Europe failed. Eight ye…

12 Sep

2023

MT Speech

Ambient air quality and cleaner air for Europe (debate)

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Mr President, air pollution is the great pandemic that every human being, wherever we live, is experiencing all over the world. Although comparisons are odious, we need to understand how important it is to take immediate actions on air pollution. Do you know that more people die every year in Malta due to air pollution than, unfortunately, they left us due to the COVID-19 pandemic? Over 500 people…

13 Jul

2023

EN Speech

Public access to documents – annual report for the years 2019-2021 (debate)

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Mr President, and good morning, Madam Commissioner, I’m sorry to say, but I don’t believe that the European Commission should be happy because there are more pages being given to the public and to us parliamentarians. Because when you look at the actual pages, you’ll find that so much of it is just being blocked and redacted. And my only experience of this was when, during the pandemic, we had the…

12 Jul

2023

MT Speech

Delivering on the Green Deal: risk of compromising the EU path to the green transition and its international commitments (debate)

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Ms President, today was a very good day for European citizens but it seems not to have been a good day for the European People's Party, because today it became clear how Nationalist politics is based only on greenwashing. They say that they are concerned with the environment, but at every chance they have to try to weaken the laws that protect our environment, weaken the fight against climate chan…

12 Jul

2023

EN Speech

The need for EU action on search and rescue in the Mediterranean (debate)

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Madam President, in recent news, we witnessed all assets deployed, millions spent and all news channels stopped their regular broadcasting and focused on the search and rescue of five very rich people who went missing in a submarine to have a look at The Titanic. It was good that everyone did their utmost to try and bring them to safety. But let us not forget that there are countless others – peop…

11 Jul

2023

EN Speech

2023 Annual Rule of law report (debate)

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Madam President, there must be no shortcuts, no compromises, no derogations when it comes to the rule of law in any country, Member State or not. Because a violation of the rule of law is a direct threat to our fundamental rights as human beings. A threat to our nature, a threat to our environment, a threat to our health, a threat to our dignity and a threat to our lives. I have always called myse…

10 Jul

2023

EN Speech

Protection of journalists and human rights defenders from manifestly unfounded or abusive court proceedings (debate)

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Mr President. We in the EU must champion journalists’ protection and the urgent need for the strongest laws against SLAPPs. Europe and all our Member States should always stand on the principles of freedom of the press and the right to express opposing views. Colleagues, we must not allow the governments and the Council to weaken the Commission’s proposals. The rich and those with powerful interes…

14 Jun

2023

MT Speech

Implementation and delivery of the Sustainable Development Goals (debate)

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Ms President, we have less than seven years left to implement the 2030 Agenda. We have a clear decision before us: we can either use the remaining years to show the rest of the world that we are not ready to practice what we preach or challenge the status quo and compensate for the time lost with concrete actions, especially on the environment and climate. Adopting the voluntary review in the Euro…

14 Jun

2023

EN Speech

Surrogacy in the EU - risks of exploitation and commercialisation (topical debate)

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Madam President, a few years ago, my male partner’s sister spoke to us, telling us that should we want to build a family, she would be willing to help us to do so. She did so unprompted, unasked for, but she wanted to be there to help, should we want to. Therefore, I really much agree with what Pierre Karleskind said earlier with regards to people wanting to help others. This debate has been asked…

13 Jun

2023

MT Speech

Establishment of the EU Ethics Body (debate)

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Ms President, for the last four years we have been waiting to see what was promised on an Ethics Commission to be implemented for the European institutions. I think of Europe, as a European Parliament, as a boast of the fact that we are very much protecting the rule of law, that we have mechanisms to ensure that the different Member States abide by the rule of law and that they have the highest po…

11 May

2023

MT Speech

Protecting and restoring marine ecosystems for sustainable and resilient fisheries - Agreement of the IGC on Marine Biodiversity of Areas Beyond National Jurisdiction (High Seas Treaty) (debate)

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Mr President, a giant surrounded by sea in a country where the sea represents every aspect of our lives: leisure, food, physical and mental health, economy and work, and we must undoubtedly combat abuse that certainly does not come from small artisanal fishermen. We have seen the European Environment Agency’s warnings about the current state of degradation of European seas and we must address the …

10 May

2023

MT Speech

Externalising asylum applications and making funding to third countries conditional on the implementation of return agreements (topical debate)

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Mr President, Saleh – a name I am using to protect the identity of a 24-year-old from Yemen – has been persecuted, raped for food, detained at gunpoint by those supposed to protect him after his parents expelled him from home because he is gay at the age of 18. He lived in caves, eaten from litter, fell on pavements in Yemen, and now in Egypt, where he is now, after helping him escape from Yemen. …

20 Apr

2023

MT Speech

IPCC report on Climate Change: a call for urgent additional action (debate)

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Mr President, the report paints a clear picture of the future that we should expect according to what we decide to do now and in the next decade. Our decisions will have an impact not only in the short term but for thousands of years. The responsibility we have on our backs as legislators is very great and should push us to take tough decisions that leave no one behind. We must protect the most vu…

17 Apr

2023

MT Speech

Revision of the EU Emissions Trading System - Monitoring, reporting and verification of greenhouse gas emissions from maritime transport - Carbon border adjustment mechanism - Social Climate Fund - Revision of the EU Emissions Trading System for aviation (debate)

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Mr. President, we are living in an unprecedented time. On the side of a climate emergency we have to fight it in the strongest possible way. At the same time, the highest inflation rates across Europe. Citizens care about the environment, but at the same time they cannot afford more burdens. They want us to go beyond Europe's buzzwords, and expect direct help in their pocket to tackle environmenta…