Verbatim report of proceedings

Wednesday, 5 October 2022 - Strasbourg

Russia’s escalation of its war of aggression against Ukraine (debate)

  Miapetra Kumpula-Natri (S&D). – Mr President, Europe has a common and share a common understanding and it’s very clear we stand with Ukraine to help it defend its territory, each square meter, and to stay a sovereign state.

We need to make the world see that any threat to Russians is from their own president. It’s not from NATO, the EU or Europe, it’s their president who will threaten their morality, economical stand, and sending men to Ukraine to kill Ukrainians.

But in this war we have on our continent, we also need to protect the rest of Europe. Security is the highest priority – whether it’s an energy crisis or is it unbearable prices, the lack of energy because of so much reducing energy from Russia. It is a cold winter to manage if we don’t succeed with the savings too.

I welcome the word from the Commission President to raise the protection of all the critical infrastructure. And also I welcome the words and general guidelines for visa issue, the Commission statement that every Member State should take into account the security when issuing visas to Russians.