29
Apr
2026
Watch
EU strategy in response to the ongoing Middle East crisis, its implications on energy prices and the availability of fertilizers (joint debate)
Madam President, Commission, Council representative, dear colleagues, a lot is on our table. I wanted to highlight from an EPP point of view three issues from a content perspective. The first is that Europe needs urgently economic growth, and we know what to do. Simplification started already. Trade is on a good way. On investments, yesterday we agreed on a strong MFF for the future. But the key of everything is the single market, our own economic base. And that is why having clear projects in mind – 28th regime, energy grids, capital markets union – after two years of Draghi, it is now a good moment that in Cyprus we agreed on the roadmap, that we have, for the first time, a binding understanding of how to implement, with clear milestones, the single market strategy until the end of 2027. That is a great step forward and also for us the responsibility is now to deliver. The second thing I want to mention is obviously, in light of the economic developments in Europe, the energy costs, with the geopolitical situation behind. You know, this crisis proves again that we need more sovereignty of our energy supply. Renewable energies are the future, and to fight against climate change is not anymore only an ecological issue, it is obviously an issue for a sovereign Europe. So that is why the EPP stands on the side of the ETS1. We want to make it pragmatic in the implementation, but we stick to what we have agreed in the last years. We also have to finalise the energy market, especially with the energy grids package. We have to have a careful look at the fertilisers because that's important, and we need nuclear as a base. That's the truth; otherwise sovereignty will not work. And the third point I want to mention is that Nikos Christodoulides in Cyprus did the efforts to put Article 42(7) on the table – the military dimension of our European solidarity, and that is urgently needed. The EPP was pushing for a defence committee inside of the Parliament. We have for the first time now a Defence Commissioner, an EPP friend, who is chairing this. And we want to take now the next step: clear rules for implementing Article 42(7). People see and feel the uncertainty, especially in Cyprus, and Europe has to give an answer. Dear colleagues, that is what I want to mention on content. Let me finally reflect on developments in two Member States, which are, for us, of special importance. First of all, I want to say a word on Romania. Last year, the Romanian people voted for their leadership, and I was quite happy that, finally, the candidate from AUR didn't become president of Romania, that the pro-European forces fought and they won. And that was an important battle in Romania. The EPP and the Socialists together had the mandate to reform Romania, to do the necessary steps, together with the milestones presented by the Commission. Yesterday, the Socialists and AUR party together presented a motion of censure against the pro-European, stable government, and Iratxe just asked me, 'Why? What is the background of this? What is the reasoning for taking such a government now into question together with AUR'? I just want to say if the EPP would do the same against a socialist prime minister – to take a socialist prime minister into question, together with a right populist party – you know, we would have here thousands of initiatives in the European Parliament. That's not my style of doing things. I just ask the question, and probably you can also clarify from the Socialists whether you want to go further with the cooperation with AUR in the future. And the second thing I want to mention is because we still have positive news, we still have very positive news, and that is that we saw the young people in the streets of Budapest a few weeks ago, where they were telling the audience, the public: 'Russia out' and 'We are Europeans'. I was myself two years ago in Budapest to welcome the Tisza party inside of our EPP team – a great moment that they repaid now the trust we invested into them. That's great to see that Péter Magyar, together with the Tisza friends, really won back Hungarian votes and people for a pro‑European approach. We are proud about this and we see the first results now, with the EUR 90 billion being now released and being now ready to be transformed towards the Ukrainian friends. And the populists and extremists in Europe lost their spin doctor – so Putin's puppets, those who are defending Chinese and Russian and other interests in the European Council and other formats, have lost their leader. That's great – good news for all of us. Dear colleagues, 'we won' slogans are not winning any more: solutions are winning Europe, and future solutions won in Hungary. Thank you to the Tisza friends for this success story.