30/09/2025 | 16:42:29 Mister President, First of all, I would like to congratulate our newly elected Secretary General in front of our guests as well. Mister Speaker of the Senate of Kazakhstan, dear colleagues, I am honoured to stand before you today to open this debate on the relationship between the Parliamentary Assembly and Kazakhstan, a country of great importance at the crossroads of Europe and Asia. This debate comes at a decisive moment. Our continent is facing a profound geopolitical transformation... 30/09/2025 | 15:44:01 Dear colleagues, Congratulations to you, Ms Despina CHATZIVASSILIOU. You are the symbol of the civil service. You have been able to set a very high standard in this regard for the colleagues working in the organisation. I know that if you tell them anything, they will respect your position. I think this is the dream of everybody in every organisation. I hope that this kind of diplomatic - it may sound strange, civil service and diplomacy - but this kind of diplomatic ability of yours to... 29/09/2025 | 17:13:38 Thank you very much for this lively debate. First of all, I would like to respond to the Polish elections. However, I'm convinced that my colleague is also having opinions about this. I'm grateful to the Polish colleagues who were dwelling on this issue, and I believe this proves very clearly that foreign external influence may not just come from Russia. Foreign influence may come from other directions. And we all have to be aware of this very complex phenomenon, and how to protect our... 29/09/2025 | 11:54:58 Secretary General, I would like to welcome the very honourable guests in the chamber. There are guests from Greece from Mount Athos with us. Father Ephraim from the Vatopedi monastery and Father Eliseos from the Simonopetra monastery. We have been very much honoured on the invitation of our President, Mr Theodoros ROUSOPOULOS to visit Mount Athos with the colleagues of the Presidential Committee. And we have experienced, among a lot of things, living faith. We have experienced that... 23/06/2025 | 12:18:10 Thank you, Mister President. Dear colleagues, Mr Frank SCHWABE said that there are countries that want to undermine our values. I hope he did not mean the letter of the nine prime ministers on the European Convention of Human Rights. I think we need to demonstrate a bit more self-criticism as a consequence of this letter. Me, personally, I would like to welcome the letter of the nine prime ministers, and I'm sure that there are many other prime ministers who would have signed this letter if... 10/04/2025 | 17:49:20 Thank you very much, Mister President. Dear colleagues, Thank you very much for your contributions. Many of you have underlined the importance of strengthening the European unity. I think that is a very important idea. Ms Yelyzaveta YASKO underlined this. We are at a moment when there are multiple reasons to take this very seriously and to give a thought to what European unity means for all of us. Secondly, I would like to underline that when we are building up European unity, it is very... 10/04/2025 | 17:14:36 Mister President, Dear colleagues, I am honoured to stand before you today to open this debate on the interconnections between the Council of Europe and the European Political Community. This topic is of paramount importance as we navigate the complex geopolitical landscape of our continent at a critical time. A new European political architecture is just coming into existence, similarly to the changes in 1989. Firstly, let us acknowledge the context in which the European Political Community... 08/04/2025 | 17:16:48 Thank you very much, President. Dear colleagues, I do agree with our rapporteur in the sentence that people are arising and they are standing up. Probably, we don't mean in the same way as the rapporteur thinks, but I believe that the debate about freedom of assembly, about pride demonstrations and about gender is important as it really reflects change in our civilisation. The West is at a cultural crossroads, in my opinion. Gender mainstreaming or respecting constitutional identities... 07/04/2025 | 12:12:12 Mister President, Secretary General, colleagues, The democratic pact is most welcome. And I think the urgency of it, in view of the past few days, is even more important. What do we experience? We are experiencing the political weaponisation of criminal justice. Yes, colleagues, there is a democratic backsliding, but this time not in Budapest, not in Belgrade. But it has arrived in France, it has arrived in Poland. We have all experienced the news about the Paris demonstration yesterday. And... 28/01/2025 | 10:34:45 Thank you, Mister President, dear colleagues, Secretary General, dear Dora, Congratulations for this important report. I think we know that we need to look outside the Council of Europe. We need to look outside Europe under present global circumstances. Our attention every day is focusing today on Washington D.C., what's happening there. I think this report is extremely important from this perspective. It helps us to look outside Europe I am glad we have this report in front of us. I would...