04/10/2010 Session
Speaking at a press conference on the occasion of the Autumn session of the Parliamentary Assembly, PACE President Mevlüt Çavusoglu today expressed his concern at the recent rise of populist and extremist candidates and groupings, obtaining significant results in many countries at regional and national elections. “They exploit the resentments stirred by economic decline and social crisis as they are elected on an 'anti'-ticket - anti-immigration, anti-Muslim, anti-Europe. We have to carefully monitor these movements as they have become a parliamentary force and start to influence how other parties behave and speak,” he stressed.
“Another matter of concern for us are the recent outrages against Roma in Europe. I stressed that measures taken in some European countries certainly did not help to improve the integration of this vulnerable minority and I warned that they were likely to lead to an increase in racist and xenophobic feelings in Europe. We must now concentrate on giving the much-needed political impetus to existing national and international efforts for the sustainable integration of Roma. I therefore give my full support to the Secretary General’s initiative to convene a high-level meeting on Roma on 20 October 2010 in Strasbourg,” the PACE President concluded.