Connect with us

Foreign

MEPs Choose David-Maria Sassoli As New European Parliament President

Published

7 years ago

on

David-Maria Sassoli called for a return to the spirit of the EU’s founding fathers

Italian former journalist David-Maria Sassoli has been selected as the new president of the European Parliament.

Mr Sassoli, 63, received the support of 345 out of a total of 667 MEPs in the second round of voting in Strasbourg.

The centre-left politician beat three other candidates and will assume the role of assembly speaker immediately.

The vote comes a day after EU leaders agreed nominations for the bloc’s top jobs, with a woman for the first time proposed as European Commission chief.

What is Sassoli’s vision for Europe?

In a speech following Wednesday’s result, Mr Sassoli spoke of an “imperfect” union in need of reform, calling for the EU to return to the spirit of its founding fathers, who swapped warfare and nationalism for peace and equality.

“We need to strengthen our capacity to play a leading role in democracy,” he said, focusing particularly on the need for reform to the EU’s system for asylum seekers. “You can’t continue to kick this down the road. We don’t want citizens asking ‘where’s Europe’ every time an emergency happens.”

He then described Brexit as “painful”, adding: “The European Parliament will guarantee the independence of European citizens – only they are able to determine their history.”

EU Parliament graphic
Presentational white space

Mr Sassoli replaces another Italian, ex-army officer Antonio Tajani.

Who has been picked for top EU job?

The night before, marathon talks over who will take over the EU’s top jobs came to a close with the surprise choice of German Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen to replace Jean-Claude Juncker.

Her nomination has to be approved by a majority of MEPs in a vote to be held in Strasbourg on 15 July.

Mrs von der Leyen was due to visit MEPs on Wednesday to discuss her nomination. If her candidacy is rejected, national leaders will have a month to nominate a replacement.

What are European media saying about von der Leyen?

German Defence Minister von der Leyen

On the face of it, it’s a historic double first for Europe, the nomination of two women, Ursula von der Leyen and Christine Lagarde, to lead the European Commission and the European Central Bank respectively.

For some media, however, it’s very much a return to business as usual after turbulent times.

It amounts to a successful operation by French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel to “solder the Franco-German tandem back together again”, according to right-leaning French daily Le Figaro.

The choice of a German and Frenchwoman for the EU’s top jobs “shows a rebalancing in favour of the big countries, especially the Franco-German tandem, and confirms that Europe remains a Carolingian affair”, writes the left-leaning French daily Libération, referring to the medieval empire which straddled what are now Germany and France.

Italy’s left-leaning daily Il Messagero detects a level of cynicism worthy of the historical film The Leopard. In that film, a noble family grapples with revolutionary times by adopting the principle that “for things to remain the same, everything must change”.

“Behind the new feminine face of the community leadership,” the paper writes, “is a Leopard-style operation in the sense that the change is a return to the Franco-German monopoly über alles”, Il Messagero deliberately uses the German term for “above all else”, with its Nazi-era connotations.

Christine Lagarde, the French current head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), has been nominated as the first woman to lead the European Central Bank (ECB).

Belgian liberal Prime Minister Charles Michel has been chosen to replace European Council President Donald Tusk.

Donald Tusk tells the BBC the new leaders will be as consistent on Brexit as the current team

Spain’s foreign minister Josep Borrell is nominated as EU foreign policy chief. A Catalan economist, he held the post of European Parliament president from 2004-2007.

Who were the other contenders for parliament presidency?

On Wednesday, members of the European Parliament elected in May voted in a secret ballot for their choice of one of four candidates.

Members of the European Parliament queue to vote in the election of the new president during the first plenary session of the newly elected European Assembly, 3 July 2019MEPs queue to vote during the election of the new European parliament president in Strasbourg

Ahead of the vote, contenders for the position were each given a few minutes to pitch their ideas to fellow MEPs in the Strasbourg assembly:

  • David-Maria Sassoli: “I am applying because I believe that Europe will be stronger only with a European Parliament capable of playing a more important role.”
  • Ska Keller, European Green Party (German): “The European Union is more important than ever. You have answered the hateful rhetoric of the European right… with a mandate to strengthen the European Union.”
  • Jan Zahradil, Alliance of Conservatives and Reformists in Europe (Czech): “Among the four candidates I am the only one who comes from Central/Eastern Europe, from outside the eurozone, from a small/medium-sized country.”
  • Sira Rego, European United Left-Nordic Green Left (Spanish): “Time is running out for the future of our planet. Neoliberal solutions and carbon trading are not going to solve this climate crisis.”
Related Topics:
Click to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Foreign

Israel’s War On Gaza: List of Key Events, Day 101

Published

3 years ago

on

15th January 2024

By

Israel's war on Gaza: List of key events, day 101 | Israel War on Gaza News | Al Jazeera

Dozens of Palestinians killed in overnight Israeli strikes in central and south Gaza as Red Sea tensions rise.

Here’s how things stand on Monday, January 15, 2024:

Latest updates and human impact

  • Israeli attacks continue unabated overnight killing and wounding dozens of civilians in central and southern Gaza. At least 22 people were killed and a large number injured as a result of Israeli forces targeting al-Thalatheni Street in the central Gaza Strip.
  • Yemen’s Houthi rebels fired an antiship cruise missile toward an American destroyer in the Red Sea, which was shot down by a US fighter jet, announced US Central Command (CENTCOM) on X.
  • This was the first US-acknowledged Houthi attack since the US strikes on Yemen on Friday.
  • Hamas released a 37-second video showing three Israeli captives held in Gaza on Sunday, saying they would reveal the fate of the captives on Monday and urging the Israeli government to stop the offensive.
  • The Israeli military says it has shifted to a new phase of the war focused on the southern end of Gaza, where almost 2 million internally displaced Palestinians are running out of safe spaces to shelter.
  • The Gaza Ministry of Health has said almost 24,000 people have been killed in the Israeli offensive. More than 60,000 people have been wounded in 100 days of war.

Diplomacy

  • Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday that his country will pursue its war against Hamas until victory and will not be stopped by anyone, including the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
  • The White House said on Sunday that “it’s the right time” for Israel to scale back its military offensive in the Gaza Strip.
  • Egypt’s State Information Service (SIS) said in a statement on Sunday that one of the biggest obstacles to the timely delivery of sufficient aid to Gaza was Israeli inspection of the aid. The statement came after Israel blamed Cairo for the delay in aid delivery to Gaza during its defence at the ICJ.
  • US Secretary of State Antony Blinken posted on X on Monday, calling for the release of the remaining captives held in Gaza on the 100th day since they were taken by Hamas. He did not mention the Palestinian casualties.
  • Australia’s Foreign Minister Penny Wong, who described herself as a “friend of Israel” to the press, will travel to Jordan, Israel, the occupied Palestinian Territories and the United Arab Emirates this week, her office said on Monday.

West Bank raids and violence

  • Israeli forces arrested 25 students staging a sit-in in protest against high tuition fees at An-Najah University in Nablus. Al Jazeera’s Hamdah Salhut reported that the protesting students received a text message from Israeli forces telling them to “surrender now”.
  • Israeli forces have reportedly raided the family home of Nael al-Barghouti, the longest-serving Palestinian prisoner, in the village of Kobar, in Ramallah, in the occupied West Bank.
  • The Israeli army said on Friday that it killed three Palestinian men who infiltrated a West Bank settlement and fired upon soldiers.
  • The Israeli military killed two Palestinians after accusing them of ramming their car through a checkpoint near Hebron.
  • Local sources reported that Israeli forces bulldozed two Palestinian-owned houses during a Sunday midnight raid in the city of Qalqilya, Palestinian news agency Wafa reported.
  • Armed Israeli settlers broke into the village of Burin, south of Nablus, and attacked Palestinian residents’ houses and properties after midnight on Sunday, Wafa reported.
  • “Violent raids and arrests have become part of the fabric of daily life in the occupied West Bank,” Al Jazeera’s Mohammed Jamjoom, reporting from Ramallah in the occupied West Bank, said. At least 347 Palestinians have been killed and thousands have been arrested since October 7.

 

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES
Continue Reading

Foreign

Hamas Says Will Kill Hostages if Israeli Attacks On Gaza Civilians Continue

Published

3 years ago

on

10th October 2023

By

Flames and smoke billow during Israeli attacks against Gaza on October 9, 2023

Human Rights Watch terms Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant’s call for a ‘complete siege’ on Gaza a ‘war crime’.

The Hamas movement has threatened to kill an Israeli hostage every time Israel bombs a Palestinian home without warning as Israel mobilised some 300,000 reservists and imposed a total blockade of the Gaza Strip, denying the enclave’s millions of residents access to food, water and fuel.

The warning from Hamas came on Monday as the death toll from the armed group’s surprise weekend attack climbed to 900 in Israel and revenge attacks by Israeli forces on the besieged Gaza Strip killed more than 700 people and left some 3,700 others wounded.

Residential apartment blocks, hospitals, schools and a mosque have been among the sites attacked by Israeli fighter jets, artillery and drones, according to media reports and witnesses.

Hamas spokesperson Abu Ubaida issued the threat to kill Israelis from the dozens held captive by the armed group. He said an Israeli hostage would be killed for every Israeli bombing of a civilian house without warning.

Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen said more than 100 people were taken captive by Hamas during the deadly cross-border incursion over the weekend.

As Israeli forces conducted intense retaliatory attacks on Gaza on Monday, Israel’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant drew international condemnation by announcing a total blockade of the densely populated and besieged enclave, which is home to 2.3 million people.

Gallant said Israel would impose a “complete siege” on Gaza. “No electricity, no food, no water, no gas – it’s all closed.”

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said he was “deeply distressed” by the siege announcement and warned that Gaza’s already dire humanitarian situation will now “only deteriorate exponentially”.

A mourner carries the body of Palestinian boy Saad Lubbad, who health officials said was killed in Israeli strikes, during his funeral in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, October 9, 2023. REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa
A mourner carries the body of Palestinian boy Saad Lubbad, who health officials said was killed in an Israeli attack, during his funeral in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, on October 9, 2023 [Ibraheem Abu Mustafa/Reuters]

Guterres also said some 137,000 people were taking shelter with the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) at schools across Gaza.

UNRWA said on Tuesday that almost 190,000 people have been displaced in Gaza amid the Israeli attacks and the figure is expected to grow further as the violence intensifies.

Nearly half a million people have also not received food rations this week in Gaza as UN food distribution centres have been forced to remain closed amid the Israeli onslaught, UNRWA said.

Human Rights Watch said Israel’s total blockade on the necessities of life for everyday people in Gaza was a war crime.

“Defense Minister Gallant’s statements are abhorrent,” Omar Shakir, Israel and Palestine director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement.

“Depriving the population in an occupied territory of food and electricity is collective punishment, which is a war crime, as is using starvation as a weapon of war. The International Criminal Court should take note of this call to commit a war crime,” he said.

Shakir also condemned the threat by Hamas to kill hostages, warning that such action was also a war crime.

“All hostages should be safely released to their families,” he said.

On the diplomatic front, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan called on Hamas and Israel to immediately end violence and protect civilians, the Egyptian presidency said.

Erdogan urged Israel against “indiscriminately” attacking civilians and delivered measured criticism of Hamas, urging both sides to respect the “ethics” of war.

The United Kingdom, French, German, Italian and US governments issued a joint statement on Monday recognising the “legitimate aspirations” of the Palestinian people and supporting equal measures of justice and freedom for Israelis and Palestinians alike.

INTERACTIVE_DEATH_TOLL_INJURED_ISRAEL_PALESTINE_OCT10_2023_0415
They said they would remain “united and coordinated” to ensure Israel can defend itself.

But the prospect that fighting could spread also alarmed the region and the world.

Lebanese armed group Hezbollah fired rockets into northern Israel in response to at least three of its members being killed in Israeli shelling of Lebanon.

Israel said one of its deputy commanders was also killed in an earlier cross-border raid from Lebanon.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES

Continue Reading

Foreign

Western Leaders Accused of Hypocrisy Over Response To Palestine, Ukraine

Published

3 years ago

on

10th October 2023

By

US President Joe Biden holds a bilateral meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the sidelines of the 78th United Nations General Assembly in New York City, the US, September 20, 2023

Social media users, including journalists and observers, are calling out what they call a ‘double standard’.

After Saturday’s surprise attack by the Palestinian group Hamas on Israel, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy took to the social media platform X to offer “condolences go out to everyone who lost relatives or close ones in the terrorist attack”.

He also stated, “Israel’s right to self-defence is unquestionable.”

Many world leaders, including US President Joe Biden and UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, shared similar sentiments.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen stated, “Israel has the right to defend itself – today and in the days to come. The European Union stands with Israel.”

Accusations of Western ‘double standards’

Some social media users have criticised these statements, saying they highlight a double standard.

Ukraine’s right to defend itself is praised by most international leaders while Russia’s invasion is condemned, but commentators said the same cannot be said about Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza.

Aaron Bastani, a leftist British journalist, said on X that there’s a “clear double standard in endorsing terrorism against civilian targets in Ukraine … and condemning it by Palestinians”.

Many users said Western diplomats and media support the Ukrainians who defend their land, but label the Palestinians fighting against Israel as “terrorists”.

https://twitter.com/KhaledBeydoun/status/1710787817415082349?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1710787817415082349%7Ctwgr%5E6acf829869e993177f32aa38aa48c02f38cb7f61%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.aljazeera.com%2Fnews%2F2023%2F10%2F9%2Fwestern-leaders-accused-of-hypocrisy-over-response-to-palestine-ukraine

An illustration of a woman’s face, in which one eye is closed beside a Palestinian flag, and one eye open beside a Ukrainian flag, has been regularly shared as a symbol of the West’s alleged double standards in how the two conflicts are viewed.

https://twitter.com/OnlinePalEng/status/1710994682883273172?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1710994682883273172%7Ctwgr%5E6acf829869e993177f32aa38aa48c02f38cb7f61%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.aljazeera.com%2Fnews%2F2023%2F10%2F9%2Fwestern-leaders-accused-of-hypocrisy-over-response-to-palestine-ukraine

Clips also emerged on social media from a CNN interview with Mustafa Barghouti, the general secretary of the Palestinian National Initiative, in which he posed the rhetorical question, “Why does the United States support Ukraine in fighting occupation – while here they support the occupier, who continues to occupy us?”

It is not the first time Western nations have been accused of double standards in their stance on the Ukraine war.

Earlier in the year, Amnesty International published a report highlighting the West’s “double standards” on global human rights.

Agnes Callamard, Amnesty’s secretary-general, told Al Jazeera at the time that the occupation of Palestinian territory was a “particularly important one”.

“Without making any comparison between Russia’s aggression and Israel … it is clear the Palestinian people are under a regime of oppression – a regime of occupation and a regime of apartheid,” Callamard told Al Jazeera.

Over the last three days, X users recirculated earlier statements calling out what they called Western hypocrisy, sharing video by the Irish lawmaker Richard Boyd Barrett from March 2022 in which he berated the Irish government’s double standards regarding Ukraine and Palestine:

“You’re happy to use the most strong and robust language to describe the crimes against humanity of [Russian President] Vladimir Putin, but you will not use the same strength of language when it comes to describing Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians.”

Barrett on Sunday again called out what he described as “shocking double standards of Western leaders supporting Ukraine resistance but condemning Palestinian[s].”

Meanwhile, others warned against comparing conflicts.

https://twitter.com/denfordauthor/status/1710993737738768607?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1710993737738768607%7Ctwgr%5E6acf829869e993177f32aa38aa48c02f38cb7f61%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.aljazeera.com%2Fnews%2F2023%2F10%2F9%2Fwestern-leaders-accused-of-hypocrisy-over-response-to-palestine-ukraine

And some cautioned that Hamas and the Palestinians should not be seen as one and the same.

Ukrainian footballer Oleksandr Zinchenko, who plays for Arsenal, posted on Instagram, stating he “stands with Israel”.

Zinchenko has been a vocal supporter of his home country in its ongoing defence against Russia, and he participated in a Game4Ukraine charity match in London earlier this year to raise money for Ukraine.

After online backlash, with some questioning an alleged double standard in his support of Israel, the footballer removed the post and switched his social media account to private.

Several people claimed that Zinchenko’s football club, in not responding to his comments, was guilty of hypocrisy after they had distanced themselves from former player Mesut Ozil’s comments in 2019 over alleged human rights abuses against Uighur Muslims in China.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA
Continue Reading

Trending

Copyright © 2013 - 2020, 47vibez Media.