What Younous spoke about.

Mr President, if there is any intellectual terror today, it is the terror that is beating down on the possibility of defending the Palestinian people. Where are the big voices? But it is true that there are no longer large voices to denounce the violence committed by the Israeli army in the middle of Ramadan in the compound of the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem. Where are the great and beautiful European consciences to condemn the far-right government of Israel, which is fuelling hatred towards the Christians of Jerusalem, who have been victims in recent days, as you know, of unnamed violence during Easter by fanatical settlers? To continue in this way, nothing will remain of the status of Jerusalem. The pasionarias of democracy and freedom are silent. Their silence speaks of their imposture. And I will conclude by saying that the savagery of minds in Europe accompanies indifference to the savagery of the world.

Mr President, there are national issues which are European issues and which we need to talk about here. Our duty today is to talk about the brutal repression, like nowhere else in Europe, that is currently taking place in France. As I speak to you, Commissioner, a protester remains between life and death. Ladies and gentlemen, France, a country that was a beacon for freedoms in the world, is now taking the dangerous slope of an increasingly violent and authoritarian method of government that undermines the guarantee of individual rights, violates fundamental rights and, ultimately, weakens democracy and the European model. Montesquieu said that in order not to abuse power, power must stop power. This is what we expect from Europe and our European Parliament.

Mr President, I have a question for the Commission. Will it, as announced, oppose sustainable fishing and the maintenance of the great marine ecological balances in the Indian Ocean, oppose the artisanal fishermen of Reunion Island, veto the courageous and responsible decision of the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission to ban floating FADs 72 days a year? Will the Commission thereby confirm its submission, in reality, to the lobbies of the Spanish and French industrial fleets which, every day, you know, for decades, without any faith or law other than profit, plunder the Indian Ocean with the worst methods? I address the Commission and ask it not to use its veto and I ask the Council not to authorise the Commission to do so, because this veto would dishonour the European Commission and confirm and incite colonial plunder in our waters.

Madam President, Commissioner, first of all, I would like to thank the Chair of the Committee, Mr Lins, for this very important debate, which talks about the difficulties faced by farmers across Europe since the outbreak of the war in Ukraine and the explosion in fertiliser prices. Commissioner, on the island of Réunion, since the beginning of the war, the price of fertilisers has doubled from EUR 700 to EUR 1 500 per tonne. And in this year of terrible drought, which reduces the incomes of planters and especially those of sugar cane growers, this increase takes them all by the throat. To date, I believe that no specific compensation measures taking into account the insularity and great remoteness of the outermost regions from the European continent have been proposed by the European Commission – and, Commissioner, I can tell you that small farmers in the outermost regions feel forgotten. That is why we are now waiting for you to take measures, based on Article 349 of the Treaty, in order to be able to help growers in the outermost regions and in particular sugar cane growers.

Madam President, Commissioner, to those who accompany their condemnation of Russia with nuances, in the face of what is the most serious act of decivilisation in Europe since the Second World War, I say: “Aren’t you afraid, in times of war, to strengthen the enemy? Have you not perceived that Vladimir Putin has been leading an authoritarian, nationalist, identity-based, religious and reactionary far-right international for years, which has become a threat to the whole of Europe? Have you not understood that all our democracies are under attack across Ukraine?” Our solidarity for the Ukrainian people in resistance against the invader is total. In this winter when Ukrainians lack everything – food, water, clothing and electricity, to heat themselves, and even to warm a dish – our help must be concrete, urgent and reinforced. It must be for the 18 million Ukrainians who, according to the UN, need emergency humanitarian aid and the 10 million who need food aid. I reiterate my call on Europe's cities and regions to join the initiative launched by President Metsola, Generators of Hope, to make up for power cuts. In these times of war, when Ukrainians are at the front to repel the Russian invader, our only line of action is humanitarian aid to the Ukrainian people and support to Ukraine to defeat the enemy. This is the prerequisite for the future peace we all want.

Madam President, Commissioner, I come from a people, the people of Reunion, who suffered a lot, who were born of a crime against humanity, slavery, and who experienced colonisation, repression and denial of their language and identity. We have, through our struggles, survived this, but through our experience, we know what it means not to be able to speak one's language, not to be able to practice one's religion, and to be summoned to choose between assimilation or submission. That is why, as a Reunionese, I know what minorities in Europe are experiencing today, which, in this time of reaction and exaltation of assumed or disguised identity nationalisms, are paying a heavy price. In this context, the protection of minorities is a fundamental duty for Europe. I think it is a duty of survival for a civilised Europe. For the world, safeguarding cultural and linguistic diversity today – undermined, as always, by processes of domination – is an issue of civilisation.

Madam President, two years ago, when the Member States agreed on the budget, it was before the war in Ukraine. This was before the ensuing humanitarian, social, economic, migration and energy crises. That was before the terrible inflation. Today, the crises are here. They combine and are sustainable. They are a real challenge to give themselves the fiscal capacity to better cope with the accidents of history, while keeping pace with the strategic ambitions of cohesion, reindustrialisation, energy transition and the fight against poverty. The solution, in reality, we know it: it is a large European budget, with large own tax resources and more autonomy vis-à-vis the Member States. The financial transaction tax alone represents an additional €50 billion. We need to put it in place now, without delay.

Madam President, Commissioner, this is not the time to compromise on principles, nor to give in to the heinous blackmail of Mr Orbán, who is using the war in Ukraine to bend us. Let us remember, in Hungary, the seers are always red, because for years, all principles have been one by one trampled underfoot: freedom of the press, independence of the judiciary, undermining the principle of fair elections, continuous violation of the rights of LGBT people, establishment of a clientelist system allowing those close to power to pocket public procurement and European funds, from the CAP to the ERDF. The measures recently proposed by the Hungarian government must of course be evaluated, but we are not fooled. These measures are insufficient. They are completely insufficient and that is why the funds must now be frozen. They must be done not to punish Hungarians, but to advance Hungary on the path of respect for the rule of law and sharing the core values that underpin membership of the European Union. To give up defending this at all costs today is to allow the poison distilled by illiberal governments to spread and, ultimately, to put the whole Union at serious risk for the future.

Dear colleague, I hear your comment, but we are here in the European Parliament and we are used to embracing the general European interest. And when it comes to challenging Member States’ attitudes and positions in the European Council, we do and there is nothing to be moved about. I want to tell you that you claim to defend fishermen, but if we continue at the current rate of predation, there will no longer be, and the UN says so, a single fish, shellfish or crustaceans available for commercial fishing by 2050, that is to say tomorrow. There is therefore an urgent need to act and there is an urgent need to protect the ecosystems in the deep seabed, which are in great danger.

Madam President, we are not fooled by the game of France, which, behind the scenes, continues to act as the best arm of the industrial fishing lobbies to prevent the closure, from 400 metres deep, of all ecosystems vulnerable to all fishing methods affecting the seabed, which has become absolutely necessary. Nor are we fooled by Spain, which intends to take the Commission to the Court of Justice to obstruct this regulation. All this says a lot. Ms Dalli, I remember, in another legislature, Commissioner Damanaki who had already dealt with the harmful action of France and Spain to obstruct the regulation on deep-sea fishing. And fortunately there was the European Parliament, fortunately there was Commissioner Damanaki and the Commission. Stand up to threats, stand up to lobbies, because the oceans and marine ecosystems are in great danger today. (The speaker agreed to respond to a "blue card" intervention)

Madam President, my dear colleague, thank you for your speech. In this debate, as Karima Delli pointed out, only two men spoke on the podium and we are only two or three men here. The question I am asking you is this: Does that worry you? What lessons do you learn for our Assembly? Clearly, this extremely important debate on the Istanbul Convention against Sexual Violence against Women is a fight that must first and foremost concern men.

Mr President, this summer the monsoon season has turned into an absolute disaster in Pakistan. Pakistan, it has been said, emits only 0.3% of greenhouse gases. And yet, today it is paying a heavy price for climate change which, combined with the unequal order of the world, is a real double penalty for poor countries and will be even more destabilizing on a global scale tomorrow. Here and there, I therefore call on the European Union to honour its commitments to developing countries and to step up its efforts to make adaptation to global warming a global priority, particularly at the next COP in Egypt.

– Mr Rzońca, I thought I had to answer a serious question, but I believe that you are forcing me to lower myself to a level to which I do not wish to lower myself. And I also want to tell you that we are Members of the European Parliament here, that we are trying to embrace the general European interest, and that in my words I did not attack anyone. I have made general remarks on the rule of law mechanism and on the sanctions that I believe should now be imposed on Hungary.

Madam President, Minister, Commissioner, I remember a time not so far away when, in the Council, there was no opposition when it came to deploying the troika to force Greece, Portugal and Spain to clean up their national budgets and subject them to the authoritarian doxa of the ‘austerity’ policies of the European Semester. But when it comes to corruption, the independence of the judiciary, our values, the application of the Charter of Fundamental Rights – the rule of law, in fact – then we squirm, and the march is very tedious. What we are asking today from the Commission and the Council is the full application of the rule of law mechanism – not a rebate – against Hungary. And we also call for guarantees for the budgetary independence of the European Public Prosecutor’s Office. (The speaker agreed to answer a blue card question)

Madam President, EUR 100 000 for an obscene rhino hunt, EUR 15 000 for a buffalo head, a few thousand euros for an elephant horn, a few euros for a rosewood board, and how much for the alleged aphrodisiac virtues of pangolin scales? It is at this price – EUR 195 billion a year, almost the equivalent of drug trafficking – that the brutal exploitation of nature by man and, let us say, the crimes of humanity against the living world are organised. That is why it is time today, I believe, to penalise buyers and holders of the objects of this traffic, because it is demand that creates supply, and the market is in Europe. I also think that this is a question of civilisation, which affects our conception of ourselves. Trade in so-called wildlife is a barbaric and wild trade by nature, and I believe that barbarism is not regulated: We fight her and we penalize her.

Madam President, Commissioner, Minister, in the heart of the European Union are Roma ghettos made up of slums on mountains of waste, with no access to drinking water, no roads, no equitable access to healthcare, education, the labour market and social assistance. It is this medieval reality that we were confronted with during our REGI mission to eastern Slovakia, and this reality is the same across Europe. That is why I ask the question: How is this possible, with the 370 billion of cohesion? This reality, Commissioner, speaks of institutional racism, and there is complicity on all floors so that nothing changes. I say this to you as Chair of the REGI Committee: The 2021-2027 programming will need to see a real impact on marginalised communities. It is the duty and obligation of the European Commission to ensure this and to take all measures in case of non-compliance. Madam President, in conclusion I would like to say that we do not accept in Europe a caste of untouchables in our Union.

Mr President, perhaps we should have reversed the order of the speeches in order for Constanze Krehl to have the final say in this debate. And for the third time, I obviously want to pay tribute to the very extraordinary work that has been done by Constanze Krehl in the REGI Committee. And I believe that there are few Members who can say that, by their action, the concrete life of European citizens will have been changed – since, Constanze, you have negotiated on three programmes of European funds. Very quickly, the climate of this debate and the overwhelming support for Constanze Krehl's report and the report on border regions show the great unity within the REGI committee and within the European Parliament, almost all political groups included, in defending cohesion policy and committing it to modernisation. This is the very condition for its future. I want to thank all the speakers who supported my report, and I am not surprised that it is the nationalists and fascists who oppose the report on border regions because, of course, they do not understand anything about it. Commissioner, in conclusion I would like to say that we are going to vote overwhelmingly tomorrow on Constanze Krehl's report. I hope we will vote overwhelmingly on my report. In its report, as in mine, as in all the reports that we have adopted in plenary, the report on the EUSF, the REGI report on islands, the reports that we are going to adopt, we are making very concrete proposals. And I do not want the own-initiative reports from our REGI committee and Parliament to end up in drawers. There is a concrete basis for the Commission to put proposals on the table. With regard to the cross-border mechanism today, there is an urgent need for both the Council and the Commission to respond to the ball launched by Parliament.

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, first of all, allow me to warmly congratulate Constanze Krehl on his excellent 8th report on cohesion in Europe, which I am sure will be overwhelmingly adopted tomorrow in plenary. With regard to border regions, I am convinced that these regions, which cover 40% of European territory – one in four Europeans, almost 120 million Europeans living on both sides of 40 internal land borders – express in their historical, geographical, economic and cultural reality what the European project really is, that they are called upon to play an increasingly important role and that they must be at the heart of all our concerns in the work we are now undertaking to think about the future of cohesion policy. In the time of the COVID crisis, when we in Europe were used to living in an area of total freedom of movement, we regained awareness of the weight of the barriers that can suddenly be imposed on us again with all the difficulties created, especially for cross-border workers. But we also saw, in the time of the COVID crisis, the strength of solidarity and the strength of cross-border cooperation in the health field, which saved lives. Today, with Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine, border awareness is resurfacing. And more than ever, we are aware that what we have managed to build in Europe is absolutely extraordinary. A common space of rights, freedoms and movement for peace. Now, the energy supply crisis, which is binding on all regions and in particular border regions, must call us to reflect on a number of new proposals. And we must consider that cross-border energy projects of European interest are undoubtedly part of the solutions we need to seek for our energy sovereignty. This seems to me to be a suggestion for REpowerEU. The report I am submitting for your approval today therefore recalls the importance of these regions and the economic, social, legal, geographical and territorial challenges that cross-border spaces face. Commissioner, you are aware of our Parliament’s commitment to the European Cross-Border Mechanism, which should make it possible to remove the legal obstacles that cause many difficulties for citizens: insufficient cross-border public transport, problems of access to employment, education, health, cultural services and leisure, to name but a few. This mechanism is now blocked by the Council and, as I said in Prague at the informal summit of cohesion ministers, we need to relaunch the process. I believe that we have been able to reconcile the positions between Parliament and the Council – I welcome the work of Mr Gozi – and we are now asking the Commission to take an initiative. As we expect the Commission to deliver on the parliamentary initiatives of our REGI Committee, in line with the commitments made by Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. We adopted own-initiative reports massively in plenary. We now expect the Commission to translate them effectively.

Mr President, Commissioner, we have entered an era of unforeseeable global disorder and major upheavals at EU level. Energy poverty, food insecurity, loss of the living world, geopolitical risks, pandemics, demographic upheavals and natural disasters make the future uncertain. And what we are sure of is that whatever climate path we take, the climate will continue to get bogged down with the multiplication of natural disasters and consequences in all sectors, for all regions of Europe. But it is not too late to prevent and mitigate the consequences. Adapting Europe's regions to global warming must become a priority, also in Europe. And that is why I say to the Commission: hear the very concrete proposals from REGI, we are ready to work with you.

Madam President, in Brazil, reality is cold in the back. Each year, 13,000 square kilometres of forests are burned. This is 120 times the city of Paris. Yet it is the defenders of indigenous peoples and the forest who are being hunted down by a criminal government with only one policy: plundering, looting and destroying a 55 million-year-old biological heritage, a common good of humanity. I say it: Bolsonaro’s racist, xenophobic and neofascist government is not only guilty of crimes against biodiversity. He is complicit in a genuine persecution of indigenous peoples, working to open the way for multinationals who are not embarrassed by the taste of blood and the smell of burnt trees. Europe would benefit from taking action to safeguard indigenous peoples and forests. This is a matter of civilisation.

Mr President, Commissioner, while we are talking, a minority of speculators shamelessly continue to profit from crises and war, when European citizens suffer. They are suffering from soaring prices in all sectors, including food and energy, and, it must be said, after the years of the COVID-19 crisis, our European peoples are exhausted. They are exhausted from seeing their living conditions continue to deteriorate after much effort. What they expect from us today are immediate decisions and the ability, in exceptional times, to take exceptional measures. Taxing crisis profiteers now to stop the record profits of multinationals, controlling energy prices, lowering VAT on basic necessities, indexing wages to inflation, increasing the Fund for European Aid to the Most Deprived so that every person can eat three times a day: Mr President, these are immediate decisions that would be effective and that could now allow millions of Europeans to live, not to survive.

Madam President, first of all, I would like to thank all the political groups in the Committee on Regional Development for supporting this important initiative for the islands, and I believe that this debate is an important moment in the relationship between the islands of the European Union and the European institutions. I listened very carefully to the Commissioner and I believe that we need to clear up any misunderstandings. The Commission cannot pretend to ignore the deep meaning of this report by playing on a confusion between the outermost regions and the other islands, which are not covered by Article 349 of the Treaty and fall under Article 174 thereof – I am thinking in particular of the islands of the Mediterranean. That is why this report aims at a full application of Article 174 today. It is true that the Commission – and regional policy, and the REGI Committee – has an ambitious action plan for the outermost regions. This ambitious action plan must be continued and maintained. But we also need to hear about the fragilities of all the islands and what they can bring to the European Union. We systematically ask you, upstream, to take into account the fragilities, particularities and specificities of both the outermost regions and the other islands of the European Union, for all the reasons that have been explained in this very rich, high-quality debate, which I hope will open a new time today for the European Union to have a genuine island ambition.

Mr President, Commissioner, today we call for a long-term vision for the European islands, based on an island pact and an island agenda. Article 174 of the Treaty is clear: the EU must pay particular attention to island regions, whose natural, severe and permanent handicaps are recognised. This particular attention today, Commissioner, does not exist enough. This is a gap to be filled and, let us say, there is clearly an underestimation of what the European islands represent. These islands have more than 20 million inhabitants, spread over around 2 400 of them – mainly in the Mediterranean and the Atlantic – and belong to 13 Member States, of which 3 are islands. In reality, Europe is an archipelago, but it still ignores it. There is evidence that it is sometimes good to recall: To live on an island is to live surrounded by water, and it is not to live on the mainland. Everything is different – the economy, transport, energy, waste management, the logic of importing, exporting and the extra costs they entail for everything, agriculture, water management, the blue economy – everything must be thought of differently. This report is therefore intended to be the founder of a new relationship between the islands and the European institutions, based on full consideration of Article 174 of the Treaty and the implementation of specific measures. This is fully justified, as insularity is also an additional vulnerability exacerbated by the crises we are experiencing. We see this with the war in Ukraine, which directly affects these regions by over-increasing costs related to insularity and remoteness. Islands are also, as we know, at the forefront of the effects of climate change, and they have been hit harder by the COVID-19 crisis. That is why we are simply calling for islands to be better taken into account in the regulations and in future budgetary discussions. We are already calling for the re-evaluation of the State aid scheme, the abolition of the de minimis ceiling, the creation of a specific programme for the islands – as there is for the Greek islands – and the creation of a compensatory envelope – all of which we are setting ourselves. Ladies and gentlemen, the world is a world of islands, and every island is a world in itself. Europe, with its islands, has the opportunity to be at the forefront for all islands in the world, just as it would benefit from building a new global island diplomacy based on OCTs and third countries. This is why our report also proposes to make 2024 the European Year of Islands. In conclusion, ladies and gentlemen, I invite you to vote overwhelmingly in favour of this report, which is intended to be the founder, the founder of a new era in the relationship between islands and the European institutions, and I call on the Commission and the Council to hear the initiative of our Parliament and also to hear the impatience of the islands, because too much time has been lost. Now is more than time to act. I'm telling you: the time of the islands has come.

Madam President, Commissioner, President of the Court of Auditors, Minister, the discharge for which I am responsible does not concern an agency, but a policy, the European Development Fund. We are now in the eleventh EDF and thus in its eleventh multiannual programming since its establishment by the Treaty of Rome in 1957, and then by the famous Cotonou Agreements, which have given a solid framework for cooperation with the African, Caribbean and Pacific countries and for development aid. The year 2020, for which we are examining this discharge, is the last year of this 11th EDF and, as of 2021, we will enter the 12th EDF and no more financing agreements can be signed under the 11th EDF. The twelfth EDF will also, for the first time, be integrated into the European multiannual financial framework and will therefore be subject to a number of European regulations from which it had previously escaped. In 2020, the financial implementation of the EDF covered financing decisions representing global commitments of EUR 2 687 000 000, contracts representing individual commitments of EUR 3 670 000 000 and payments representing EUR 4 600 000 000. And all this spending was marked by the COVID crisis, and 2020 was, in fact, a record year for payments due to the increase in disbursements to projects contributing to the fight against the COVID crisis and this also led to the acceleration of absorption. Our report points to a number of complications caused by the COVID outbreak. However, we are still concerned about the considerable increase in errors highlighted by the Court of Auditors and the refusal of beneficiary organisations to guarantee the Court full and unrestricted access to documents and supporting documents. In the 2020 implementation, I would like to underline that the Commission reacted in time and stopped funding a highly problematic project in Eritrea, relying on forced labour and slavery. And based on the experiences in Eritrea, I now call on the European Commission to step up its vigilance everywhere and to include working conditions clauses for all the projects it funds today for all countries. And vigilance must also be exercised for all projects in the Central African Republic and for European projects that risk indirectly financing the Wagner militias, which, as we know, have a considerable influence on that country’s army. In conclusion, I would also like to say that all European policies must be brought into line with the objectives of development policy. Because otherwise, the investments that are made through the EDF are annihilated in their scope. And I also want to say that the Commission must ensure that the interests of the outermost regions and the overseas countries and territories which share the same geographical area with the ACP countries are properly taken into account. In conclusion, I would like to say that EU development policy pursues the objective of eradicating poverty. But today we must also assume without hypocrisy the dimension of co-development and shared interests between the development of the ACP countries and the interests of the European Union.

Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, in a few moments we will be voting, almost unanimously I am sure, on the first package of measures that will make it possible to mobilise the Cohesion Fund to receive refugees. I would like to thank you personally, Commissioner Elisa Ferreira, for this proposal, which is growing cohesion policy. There are already 3.5 million Ukrainian refugees in the EU: a very colossal number. Once again, cohesion policy is honoured to intervene concretely in response to a crisis, as we did once the COVID-19 crisis occurred. Now cohesion policy has a duty to help refugees, NGOs, cities, regions and states that are on the front line in the face of this great upheaval. But we already know, Commissioner, that the scale of needs now requires a second package of measures and additional resources. Cohesion will respond again, and I therefore welcome the CARE proposal. +adopted yesterday by the College of Commissioners. Commissioner, you can count on the full mobilisation of the REGI Committee for its adoption - I hope, ladies and gentlemen - as soon as possible. In conclusion, I would like to tell you that Europe was born out of solidarity and that it was born out of solidarity. We can clearly see how, in these troubled times, in these times of war, in these times when we all hope for peace, only solidarity will make it possible to withstand the trials of the moment and to open up new and more integrated paths for Europe.