Verbatim report of proceedings

Monday, 10 December 2001 - Strasbourg

Order of business

  Souladakis (PSE). – (EL) Madam President, I should like to comment on the positions taken by the honourable Members in connection with the arrest of a number of Britons in Greece and, first, to assure them that, as Members of Parliament, we have no way of influencing the independence of the Greek judiciary, and rightly so, nor do I believe that you are able to influence the judiciary in your countries.

Secondly, you must know, as we said during the last debate in Brussels, that the acts for which they were arrested, at least as they have been reported in the press, are acts for which they would have been arrested in any one of the fifteen Member States of the European Union.

So we would be well advised to respect the institutions on the basis of which the fifteen Member States work together, to respect the independence of the judiciary and to respect the laws which apply in the fifteen Member States. Let us be clear on one thing: there are fifteen countries here, represented by numerous parties and numerous persuasions, all are equal and of equal value, and no one has the right to tell other countries how to act, as if they were countries which did not belong to Europe.