Proposition 53K1194

Proposition de résolution relative au soutien des mouvements démocratiques et au respect des Droits de l'Homme en Afrique du Nord et au Moyen-Orient.

General information ¶

Authors

CD&V Stefaan Vercamer
Groen Eva Brems
LE Christian Brotcorne
MR François-Xavier de Donnea
N-VA Ingeborg De Meulemeester, Els Demol
Open Vld Patrick Dewael
PS | SP Patrick Moriau
Vooruit Bruno Tuybens, Dirk Van der Maelen

Submission date

Feb. 10, 2011

Official page

Visit

Status

Adopted

Requirement

Simple

Subjects

Africa Egypt Middle East Tunisia democratisation resolution of parliament human rights

Voting ¶

Voted to adopt

Groen CD&V Vooruit Ecolo LE PS | SP ∉ Open Vld N-VA LDD MR VB

Contact form ¶

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Discussion ¶

March 3, 2011 | Plenary session (Chamber of representatives)

Full source

The rapporteur is Ms Ingeborg De Meulemeester. Three people are registered in the debate: Mr. François-Xavier de Donnea, Mrs. Christiane Vienne and Mr. by Christian Brotcorne.

Mr. President, colleagues, there is a proposal for a resolution on the developments in North Africa and the Middle East, submitted by Mr. Van der Maelen and discussed at the meeting of 15 February. Following recent democratization movements, which have occurred in the Middle East and North Africa since December 2010, the applicants request the federal government to formally continue to express its support to the people’s aspirations for more democratic control and socio-economic progress.

In particular, the committee calls for a condemnation of violence and intimidation against the population, human rights defenders and journalists, an independent investigation of human rights violations, to encourage the countries of the Middle East and North Africa to strictly respect the freedom of the press and freedom of expression there, and to call on the Egyptian military to form a pluralist interim government consisting of all democratic forces and actors from the civil sphere in order to guarantee urgent, concrete and effective measures, such as constitutional reforms. It also advocates that the European Foreign Ministers, the High Representative for Foreign Affairs and the other members of the European Commission actively support the necessary democratic transition in the region. Each party supported the proposal in the committee.

The chief speaker, Mr Van der Maelen, is convinced that this resolution follows the developments in North Africa and the Middle East. Ms. Vienne and Mr. Moriau consider the proposal very meritorious and fully support the resolution. Mrs Brems is also convinced of the quality of the text. She believes it is important that parliaments send a signal of that direction. Mrs Colen supports the proposal. It emphasizes that it affirms the right of self-determination. Also colleagues Van den Bergh, Rutten, De Permentier and Brotcorne express their support and join the supporters.

At the end of the committee meeting, we changed the headline to “proposal for a resolution on supporting democratic movements and respecting human rights in North Africa and the Middle East”. The headline thus becomes a better reflection of the support the Chamber intends to provide to the democratization process and to the aspirations of the peoples of that region. So far the report.

With your permission, Mr. Speaker, I am now developing the discussion on behalf of my group. Our N-VA Group will vote in favour of the draft resolution and considers it important to seek peaceful and humane solutions to the situation in the Middle East and North Africa.

Congratulations to your maidenspeech, mevrouw De Meulemeester. (The Applause)

Mr. Speaker, dear colleagues, we must applaud the popular movements that demand democracy, rule of law, social justice and freedom in the Arab world. We must also condemn without hesitation, in the strongest possible way, the violence that unfortunately currently accompanies some of these movements, ⁇ in Libya, where the summit of absurdity and cruelty has been reached. We must also see, through these popular movements, and rejoice, that democratic values are shared in other civilizations than ours, and therefore are not the monopoly of the European countries and of the civilization they have exported to North America, Asia or elsewhere.

The ongoing popular revolts and regime changes we are already witnessing in Egypt and Tunisia raise three major questions. The first is the following. Will these popular movements necessarily lead to authentic and stable democratic regimes? The second big question: Is the democratization of regimes in the Arab world a sufficient condition to ensure growth and stability in the region? Third, we must of course, as far as possible, help the new regimes to meet the expectations of their peoples. We must also help them establish democratic rule of law. But how ?

With regard to the first question, nothing guarantees, today, that the new holders of power will or will be able to establish truly democratic regimes from the outset. In fact, in Egypt, for example, the popular uprising resulted in a very subtle military coup. Nothing can say with certainty today that the Egyptian army will completely abandon the power it has held for 60 years. But at this stage, we must give it the benefit of doubt and help it take this step towards democracy, if it appeals to us.

Some fear that democratization and free and fair elections in the Arab world will serve as a footprint for integrist, see antidemocratic Islamist movements, which would use democracy to better destroy it. Europeans and Americans should, in my opinion, accept this risk.

We cannot call for the organization of democratic regimes and free and fair elections, and if so, then reject the winners of elections who would not conform to our wishes and share our values.

Let us not again, with, for example, the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, make the same mistakes that we made with Hamas, which legitimately won the elections in Palestine and with which Americans, Europeans and Israelis then refused to discuss! As a result, today, the Palestinian people are deeply divided and a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian problem is even more difficult.

We have too much in the past perceived democracy in the Arab world as the risk of bringing Islamism to power with its consequences for our security and that of the State of Israel. We must get out of this approach and give a chance to democracy everywhere in the world, and therefore also in the Arab world.

Will it necessarily lead to democratic regimes? Let us be lucid. The democratization of the Arab world is ⁇ an essential condition for the economic and social progress of these peoples, but it is not a sufficient condition for ensuring stability, prosperity and security there.

Indeed, the profound causes of the popular uprisings we have witnessed are obviously of an economic and social nature. First, an enormous unemployment of youth and young intellectuals in particular; an increase in agricultural and food prices that further reduces the already weak purchasing power for most of the population; the uncontrolled growth of giant cities that exacerbate social tensions.

If the regimes of the Arab popular movements do not solve these problems, they will be swept in turn, at the latest after the first legislature they have been able to ensure, and we will fall back into a chronic instability that risks to settle in North Africa and the Middle East with catastrophic consequences for us: rising energy prices, increasing illegal immigration, increasing terrorism, banditism and trafficking of all kinds between Europe, the Middle East and North Africa.

Third question: what should we do, what should the European Union do to help the new regimes and countries of the Arab world, the Maghreb, the Middle East, to solve the problems that are at the basis of the revolts and to help them establish democratic rule of law? One of the first things we can do, but only if we are asked, which we cannot impose, is to help those who are asking to establish democratic regimes in their country. And the European Union, the Council of Europe, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe with its Office of Democratic Institutions and Human Rights have acquired extensive expertise in the construction, development and consolidation of democratic regimes and electoral regimes in Eastern Europe and in the former Soviet Union. This experience can and should be put to the service of those who will ask us for it in the Middle East and North Africa.

One thing not to do, I have already said, is to manoeuvre, manipulate, or help them manipulate the democratic game to exclude forces that would not correspond to our wishes. One cannot remain credible when one preaches democracy if every time the one who wins elections, as long as they are free and just, is rejected if it is not friends to us.

Second, in order to help them, we must rethink our euro-Arab dialogue, our euro-Arab policy and our neighbourhood policy. We must strengthen economic and technical cooperation within the framework of the Barcelona Process. As you know, it has been completely paralyzed for years due to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The Arabs accuse us wrongly or rightly – ⁇ they make us a trial of intent – of wanting to use this Barcelona process to impose the presence of Israelis in forums that are, for the rest, essentially Arab. We must therefore rethink our strategy as part of this Barcelona process that has been well thought out and has very interesting tools and significant budgetary resources.

The paralysis of our Euro-Mediterranean policy comes from the impasse of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I hope that the current crisis will make Israeli conservative circles aware that time plays against Israel and that they have every interest in rapidly finding an agreement with the Palestinians. The current crisis may also make the Arab partners understand that they have an interest in dissociating Euro-Arab dialogue and Euro-Arab policy from the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. So maybe the time has come, or will come, in a few months, to relanced a series of concrete projects of economic and social cooperation that were on the table of the Barcelona process but that remained at stake for the reasons I just described.

Of course, the European Union will have to link all aid to concrete and real democratic reforms. Article 2 of the Association Agreements with the countries of the Mediterranean basin already provided for a conditionality of respect for democratic principles and fundamental rights, but Europe has followed a so-called policy of two weights, two measures. Much stricter criteria were imposed on Syria, which refused them, than on Tunisia, which, of course, accepted far more lax criteria. We are accused of double gambling. We are accused of the policy of two weights, two measures and a lack of transparency! We need to bring a cure.

The European Union will also need to re-adjust certain aspects of its neighbourhood policy on its southern flank.

However, we should remember that our Southern neighbors already receive two-thirds of the total neighborhood policy budget. And I do not think that a re-adjustment of it should be done at the expense of some countries of Eastern Europe. When traveling to Moldova or some parts of Ukraine, you see situations of extreme poverty. We must continue to help them and we cannot abandon them for other purposes based on certain political circumstances.

The re-adjustment of the neighborhood policy towards our southern flank will have to be essentially qualitative, and will probably have to be more than a budget re-balance, but I will come back to it later.

I share the view of the German government, which believes that the best policy is to intensify trade with the Arab countries instead of increasing public development aid there. We must therefore, in one way or another, link our willingness to help the Arab world to a revision of our trade policy, both on the industrial level and on the Common Agricultural Policy.

Italy wants the European Union to develop a Marshall Plan for the region. But who will finance it? Will we still ask European citizens to make sacrifices to develop such a plan for the benefit of the poorest countries in the Arab world? Such an initiative could only be conceived if it is taken, not only in cooperation with the United States, but also with the rich Arab countries. The Arab world is full of enormous wealth. Those of you who have visited Saudi Arabia, the Gulf countries, or even poorer regions, will be able to see this. One of the major problems of the Arab world is that wealth is not properly distributed there. We pay considerable sums to some of these countries to buy them their oil, but these gigantic resources they receive have not always been spent on policies that could have avoided the current popular uprisings.

If we are helping economically the countries of our southern flank – Maghreb, Machrek – we must demand that the rich Arab countries participate in this “Marshall Plan” (assuming it can see the day) and that the rich Arabs show solidarity with their less fortunate brothers.

I believe that it is only under this condition that we could consider an additional effort that is not a qualitative or purely commercial effort. I do not see why we should pay alone, we Europeans, for the collective mistakes of a friendly world. But it is to friends that one can tell the truth the easiest.

Here are some of the thoughts I wanted to raise. I will not say much more because much has already been said about it. It is clear that the MP will vote on the resolution we are discussing. We believe that it goes to the essential.

I also think that some colleagues intend to come up with more detailed resolutions on some specific aspects of the issue in the coming weeks.

Mr. Speaker, dear colleagues, we strongly supported this resolution, as the rapporteur, Mrs. De Meulemeester, recalled. We strongly supported it because this process of democratization corresponds to the political and social aspirations of the peoples of this region as a whole. We have supported it all the more as we are concerned about ensuring respect for human rights in this future process.

The situation in Libya, and more generally in the countries of North Africa, cannot leave our assembly marble. Belgium and the European Union must react to strongly condemn the repression of popular movements in these countries. Our government and the European Union have soon condemned the abuses that have taken place in recent weeks; this is for us a first step. My group would also like to welcome the action of our government and, in particular, the firm and quick reaction of its Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr. and Vanackere.

It is now for us to work on the long-term. Fears of destabilizing decades-old regimes, such as mass immigration or the rise of Islamism, cannot serve as an excuse for supporting regimes that violate human rights; regimes that declare war on their own people.

These crimes, if they are proven, cannot remain unpunished. This question of the punishment of war crimes committed against civilian populations will one day have to be the subject of our reflection.

To prevent such situations, in Africa and elsewhere, from repeating themselves in the future, it is up to all levels of power and in all our Belgian and European diplomatic relations to draw lessons from the current situation.

The success of these democratic and social demands depends on the local populations: it is their revolutions. However, if they wish, we will have to actively support them in this democratic and socio-economic transition, in particular through the European Neighbourhood Policy, without falling into interference. This is not a simple balance.

I am convinced that the 21st century will be the one of refugees, that this question will pass through our century. But the history of humanity is made of these transhumancies. As my colleague Marie Arena recalled recently in Vienna, in the post-war period, it was 600,000 Italians who came to settle in our home. There was also a transhumance and refugees. The European Neighbourhood Policy will have to incorporate long-term elements and will have to enable displaced populations to return to their homes. But in order for them to do so safely, they will need to ensure respect for human rights, with particular attention to freedom of expression and the rights of minorities in the framework of a coherent and ambitious European policy.

I will also emphasize that in this context, we must support the emergence of civil society and in particular women who play an important role in all these societies and who need our support. The best defense against radicalism is again and always democracy.

Mr. Speaker, I would not want to unnecessarily extend the debate given that there has been consensus in the committee and that we all endorse what the two previous speakers have just said. I only insist on the fact that I welcome the inclusion of a paragraph on the protection of minorities in the resolution. We often talk about the protection of Christian minorities; we have recalled this during the work of our commission. I also had the opportunity to say that there are not only them but also minorities from other religious confessions as well as cultural, tribal, linguistic minorities. The protection of these minorities in the process of democratization of the Maghreb, the Mediterranean basin and the entire Middle East is essential. This refers to a proposal adopted by our parliament just a year ago about this protection of minorities and which we were able to update with the Minister of Foreign Affairs just a few weeks ago. I am pleased to see that this element has been incorporated into the resolution.

This is a time when we are experiencing history. The Arab revolution is about democracy, about the sovereignty of the people, about a struggle for political and socio-economic rights and freedoms. It is therefore relevant that Parliament, the embodiment of our democracy, addresses this issue in a resolution. The Ecolo-Groen! group supports them wholeheartedly.

Of course, our resolutions do not change the world, but in international relations all the signals are important. Today we give the signal to the citizens who have come to the streets and still do so, that we support them in their desire for democracy and freedom and in their call for justice over the crimes committed.

The Ecolo-Green! group would also like to read in the resolution the strong call for the lifting of the state of emergency, which has not yet occurred in all the countries concerned, as well as the plea for a constructive attitude towards the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, with which all conflicts in the region are linked. However, we support the text, as it is here.

We are sending a signal, not only to the people on the streets in the Arab world, but also to our government, that we want a serious commitment of our country and of Europe to the democratization of the Arab world.

However, it does not stop here. The understanding has grown that the European policy towards the Middle East and North Africa has failed the ball by focusing merely on economic interests and encouraging or even supporting authoritarian regimes. A change of course is necessary and it must be thoughtful, committed and feasible. The Parliament’s Committee on Foreign Relations will work on this in the coming weeks, as Parliament also has an important role to play in this area and our group is looking forward to those future debates.

Mrs. Speaker, I will briefly take the microphone to thank the colleagues, because we have been able to talk with each other so easily about a proposal for a resolution. I am grateful to those who have submitted many amendments, which have made my original submitted text better.

I am especially grateful to the many colleagues who have made personal, enriching contributions to the debate in the committee and today in the plenary session, which will allow us to make a good start to the debates that we will conduct in the Committee on Foreign Relations in the coming weeks.