Proposition 53K2876

Proposition de résolution relative au soixantième anniversaire de la fin de la guerre de Corée.

General information ¶

Authors

PS | SP Philippe Blanchart, Christophe Lacroix, Patrick Moriau, Vincent Sampaoli, Éric Thiébaut

Submission date

June 12, 2013

Official page

Visit

Status

Adopted

Requirement

Simple

Subjects

North Korea South Korea peacekeeping commemoration resolution of parliament museum war war victim

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 ¶

Jan. 30, 2014 | Plenary session (Chamber of representatives)

Full source

There are two rapporteurs: Mr Waterschoot and Mr Kindermans.

We refer to our written report, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, the draft resolution on the commemoration of the 60th anniversary of the end of the Korean War was initiated by the PS Group. The Korean War, which began in 1950, made fear of the worst since, at the time, we feared the outbreak of a Third World War while Europe was suffering the wounds of the Second. This war lasted three years and resulted in a status quo situation that still plunges this region into instability.

As part of this conflict, 22 countries intervened under the UN mandate. Among them were Belgium and Luxembourg, which at the time sent 3,200 volunteers. In just over two years of fighting, we have counted 117 dead and missing, 354 seriously wounded and over 800 lightly wounded. This war is, however, a forgotten conflict, except for those who participated in it and their families.

However, we have a duty of memory in which the federal scientific institutes must play an essential role. Therefore, even if 2013 is behind us, the adoption of this text by our assembly must constitute a strong symbol of recognition for the Belgian veterans for whom a specific place was reserved during the parade of 21 July. This vote must also symbolize the attention we continue to pay to the situation on the Korean Peninsula, where, as a reminder, only a fragile ceasefire can lead to peace.

As we all know, North Korea is accustomed to provocations aimed at obtaining financial, diplomatic or humanitarian concessions. Recent news has confirmed this. At a time when all eyes are turned to the East, this vicious circle is still not broken. The dangerous diplomatic status quo that prevails in this region implies the need to establish a lasting dialogue while allowing the North Korean population access to development, human rights, ending a military dictatorship that suffocates them.

The purpose of this text is to look forward, insisting on the importance of our bilateral relations with South Korea and more broadly with this region of the world.

I hope that this text can count on your support, as was the case in the committee.

Mr. Speaker, the Flemish Interest will of course also approve this proposal for a resolution. It is about the Korean War, where our troops, yet about three thousand volunteers, for three years have fought against communism. This can sometimes be said loudly. There have been more than a hundred dead and many hundreds of wounded cases. So it is normal that we commemorate the effort and courage of these volunteers. They repressed communism and that was, as it now turns out, very right. When we see where North Korea stands today, we have correctly assessed the danger of communism at that time.

After the explanation of our “yes” vote, I would like to formulate another small comment on the small-mindedness with which something has gone through in the committee. As chairman of the committee, I had to conclude that the members of the majority voted against an amendment of Mr Ponthier, but were not too upset to simultaneously submit and approve an amendment, which was a copy of the text submitted by Mr Ponthier. The majority parties have ‘leaped’ that and I find it really small-minded, minable is said in French.

I would like to point out that the Greens did not participate. While the Greens otherwise have a lot to say in that committee, they said nothing this time, ⁇ because their roots lie in part in communism. Well, that is a comment on the side.

We will in any case adopt the proposed resolution out of respect and respect for the thousands of volunteers of the time.

Mr. Speaker, once again we are discussing an unnecessary text: a proposal for a resolution on the 60th anniversary of the end of the Korean War, a proposal from the Socialist Group.

The Belgian workers, those who lose their jobs because of Europe and government policy, will be happy to see where the Socialist MPs spend their time instead of trying to honor their eternal election promises between two 4-star meals and a few bottles of champagne dropped at the taxpayer’s expense in the parliament stalls! If citizens could walk through the halls of parliamentary houses, they would be surprised to see what the elected spend their time and spend the money of the state, the money of the taxpayers. Let us pass!

There was a bill from the CDH – nobody on their banks anyway – aiming to ban chocolate cigarettes. We can expect that all members of the parliament...

So let’s talk about uselessness instead of focusing on the real problems. It is simpler. Talking about stupidity doesn’t bother the Bilderbergs and company. Is it not, Madam?

In terms of stupidity and inutility, I looked at you with interest.

That’s okay, Mrs. Onkelinx. So you confirm that the proposal is useless and stupid.

I would like to be reminded here in this tribune that the Belgian citizen is a beneficiary of so-called bilateral socio-economic and cultural diplomatic relations with South Korea. Personally, this is the first time I hear about this. So how will commemorating the end of the Korean War bring something concrete to the Belgian citizens?

Behind this Korean War, a war of the United Nations – a terrorist organization under U.S. command; the opposite would have surprised me; they are always ready to go to war, they! They hid financial and economic interests, as is the case with almost all wars, which once again did not benefit anyone except to help Korean multinational companies penetrate the market by flooding us with their manufactured products.

Swapping the lives of our soldiers for a few juicy markets that benefit only a few shareholders and our politicians who can stay at the expense of the princess in Seoul to touch their envelope for accomplished work, is this an event to commemorate? I am also surprised that the Socialist group did not organize a trip to Seoul for a few parliamentarians of the majority, obviously sorted on the side.

In 2010, Yves Leterme, our former prime minister, so excited by love for our country that he confuses La Brabançonne with La Marseillaise, went on an official trip, he, to South Korea. At that time, the future of the Belgian automobile assembly would have been in the hands of Korea, which had a favourable take on Belgium. And why then?

One party taken, I quote him, "probably due to the death of 106 Belgian Blue Helmets during a UN mission during the Korean War sixty years ago." Oh well ! Unlike the socialists, I don’t find it funny at all to use the death of Blue Helmets to succeed in winning financial markets. It is sad! This is how our ministers trade, sacrificing our men for conflicts that are totally foreign to us. We are blackmailing to make our economic interests weigh in the balance.

In almost two years of fighting, from 6 March 1951 to the armistice of 27 July 1953, 101 Belgians died in Korea, 5 were missing, and 478 were wounded. What conclusions can we draw from this? It is simple: no Belgian, I say no Belgian, has come out winning this war! But our ministers claim to have accomplished their mission.

South Korean President Lee Myung‑bak Leterme traded in 2010, was a former CEO of the automotive company Hyundai. The collusions between the political and economic world are no longer to be demonstrated so they cringe the eyes. Like the current Mexican president, the former president of Coca-Cola Mexico, this Coca-Cola that poisones our children from a very young age.

When I say to you that our current leaders are indeed a band of criminals! I therefore do not understand very well this desire to go back into the past to remind the families of the deceased that their children, once our soldiers, were sacrificed for nothing, except to enrich a handful of individuals, and that nothing changes.

Seventy years later, North Korea is still a frightening country, where the inhabitants are forced to live in the worship of their guide, where freedom is only a fairy tale and poverty is incredibly developed, as in any good socialist-communist country that respects itself.

This “Orwellian” regime hangs us at the nose, at the pace in which our freedoms decline greatly thanks to our current leaders. As I have already done with regard to the centenary of the First World War, I am therefore opposed to the trade of memory – I leave this to others – to the macabre tourism of the memory of our soldiers sacrificed on the altar of money.

I remind my fellow citizens that our parliaments have committed hundreds of thousands of euros, preferring to commemorate hundreds of years of suffering rather than allocating these sums to help people in precarious situations. When we know that Belgians today live without heating, that some have to deal with less than 500 euros a month to survive, that elderly people are abandoned in the most total deprivation, that more and more young people find themselves on the streets, there is something to revolt! As those who support me say, I am the only one among you to be in conformity with what the people demand. It is funny to see how much you despise me, how much you despise the people!

So I decided to be the marker of the regime shift that we observe by proving to the people that freedom, ethics, morality, democracy are now merely tricks, fables, and that you are merely collabos of this inhuman and rotten system that, every day, plunges a little more into its incoherence and immorality. Your complicit silence, your selfish and, for some, unconfessable interests, will be right about you.

I will therefore vote against this proposal for a resolution because, given the precarious situation of some Belgians, the deterioration of our quality of life, the flagrant decrease of our purchasing power and the permanent decline of our social achievements, I consider that we do not have a single euro to spend to commemorate a war in which we should never have participated.

I give you a advice: if you find that we have too much money, if some political parties have too much money on their account – like the Socialist Party with its 12 million euros of wealth – if the government has money to waste, give it to the people, give it to the Belgian citizens! I can assure you that they need it very much.