Karamanou (PSE).
– (EL) Madam President, I should like to change the subject and get us
off this tack.
Today is International Human Rights Day
and I wish to express my distress and horror at the tragic death of the eight
refugees, including three children, who suffocated in a container in southern
Ireland. Eight dead refugees who were the victims not so much of the
traffickers, as the authorities hastened to assure us, but of European
indifference and a global system which allows and encourages the free movement
of heads, but not the free movement of people, of a system which condemns two
thirds of the people on this planet to live in conditions of unbelievable
poverty.
The European Parliament cannot stand by
impassively in the face of the present-day refugee tragedy, nor can we feel
safe in fortress Europe surrounded by such human misery and such a huge
development divide.
I think it is a very good sign that we
shall be debating the question of refugees and immigrants during the urgent
debate on Thursday, and I would be most obliged, Madam President, if you would
convey these views to the Council in Laeken.