3. Statement by the President

Verbatim reports

The President made a statement to mark the 70th anniversary of the adoption in Paris of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. He highlighted Parliament's commitment to human rights, in particular through the Sakharov Prize, and congratulated the 2014 and 2016 winners (Denis Mukwege and Nadia Murad respectively), who had just been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

In addition, he expressed Parliament's condolences at the death on 8 December 2018 of the human rights activist and former dissident Lyudmila Alexeyeva, who had received the 2009 Sakharov Prize in Strasbourg on behalf of the Memorial human rights group.

He finished by mentioning the leading role played by journalists in defending human rights and pointed out that some of them paid for this commitment with their lives (for example Daphne Caruana Galizia, Jan Kuciak and Jamal Khashoggi) or with prison sentences.

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The following spoke: Matt Carthy.