Activities of Bas BELDER related to 2018/2150(INI)
Plenary speeches (1)
2018 Report on Turkey (debate) NL
Shadow reports (1)
REPORT on the 2018 Commission Report on Turkey PDF (170 KB) DOC (65 KB)
Amendments (11)
Amendment 48 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 2 a (new)
Paragraph 2 a (new)
2 a. Strongly condemns Turkey for its “hostage taking policy” i.e arresting the nationals of other countries to attain political and economic gains;
Amendment 56 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 3 a (new)
Paragraph 3 a (new)
3 a. Notes the rising power of Turkey’s Directorate of Religious Affairs (Diyanet) which every year enjoys a higher share in the national budget, a trend that indicates Erdogan’s administration’s “religionization policy of the Turkish public”; asks the European Union and its Member States to investigate the activities of Diyanet on European territory due to accusations against Diyanet officials of espionage, covert surveillance and recruiting agents; is highly concerned about indications of exploiting the Diyanet by the Turkish intelligence agency whether to hunt opposition leaders from the Gülen movement or any other opponents and urges the security institutions on the European and Member States’ level to investigate this serious violation of their sovereignty and public order;
Amendment 95 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 6 a (new)
Paragraph 6 a (new)
6 a. Urges the government and parliament of the Republic of Turkey to adopt a hate crimes law that can protect minorities from physical and verbal attacks, conform the criteria of Copenhagen for candidate countries of the EU stipulating respect for and protection of minorities;
Amendment 103 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 6 b (new)
Paragraph 6 b (new)
6 b. Rejects the description of Judaism and Christianity as falsified religions in Turkey’s school textbooks; demands the competent Turkish authorities to revise this dangerous religious prejudice that poisons the mindset of young people;
Amendment 106 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 6 c (new)
Paragraph 6 c (new)
6 c. Strongly condemns Turkey’s officially hosting and supporting of extremist Palestinian ideologues like the prominent Hamas members Nawaf al- Takruri and Abdelfatah al-Awaisi resulting in propagating religious incitement and terrorism in the region; underlines that Hamas is labelled by the EU as a terrorist organization;
Amendment 108 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 6 d (new)
Paragraph 6 d (new)
6 d. Points to the fact that there are less than 15,000 Jews in Turkey and their number reportedly keeps declining; shares the deep concerns of Turkey’s Jewish community about the appointment to presidential advisory councils of well- known public figures who have made blatant anti-Semitic statements; is appalled by the fact that open, as well as hidden, antisemitism has become part of daily life in Turkey; urges the Council and the Commission to strongly condemn this evil and address the Turkish authorities on this abject demonization of Jewish people;
Amendment 111 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 6 e (new)
Paragraph 6 e (new)
6 e. Stresses that churches in Turkey continue to face serious problems with establishing or continuing the use of places of worship; fully supports the request by churches to use church buildings, that are now owned by local and national government institutions but not yet destined for other purposes, for their holiday worship services; urges the Council and Commission to address to the Turkish authorities the non-renewal of the work contracts of public officials in Izmir, Istanbul and Mersin because of their Christian identity; condemns the serious increase of negative local press coverage against churches and their members and supports the request of Turkey’s churches that within the framework of freedom of expression and media there needs to be an effective and rapid oversight mechanism established with regard to intolerance in the media and which can deal with visual and written publications which use hate speech, inciteful rhetoric and prejudice; backs the request by Turkey’s churches that Justice offices should start official actions against hate crimes and speech without the need of an official complaint to be filed;
Amendment 141 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9 a (new)
Paragraph 9 a (new)
9 a. Observes that Turkey’s military interventions in northern Syria’s Jarabulus and Afrin have turned these two enclaves into Turkish military and economic protectorates resulting in a process contradicting Turkey’s official statement of 2018 supporting the territorial integrity of Syria; is concerned that Turkey also seeks to change the demographical balance in the Afrin canton by re-settling Syrian Arab Sunni refugees from Turkey to the Kurdish populated region while by doing so Turkey seeks to have a de-Kurdified southern border;
Amendment 189 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 14 a (new)
Paragraph 14 a (new)
14 a. Deplores the ineffectiveness of the Office of the Ombudsman, founded in 2012 in Turkey, for although many applications were filed at the institution throughout the years the Office of the Ombudsman did not make its influence felt in the public and refrained from criticizing the government even in the face of serious corruption accusations against senior members of the Turkish cabinet; concludes that in today´s Turkey the Office of the Ombudsman, which recommendations are not binding, figures only as a façade;
Amendment 311 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 19 a (new)
Paragraph 19 a (new)
19 a. Condemns Turkey’s belligerent attitude in the Eastern Mediterranean against Greece and Cyprus as illustrated by Turkey’s threats against the companies taking part in the East-Med pipeline project;
Amendment 313 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 19 b (new)
Paragraph 19 b (new)
19 b. Notes that on April 3, 2018, thanks to Russian support Turkey officially launched its nuclear program by starting to build a nuclear reactor in Akkuyu Mersin while ignoring the claims of environmental activists that the reactor is being built in an earthquake zone; urges the European Commission and Council to address its concerns to the Turkish government at the high potential of environmental and humanitarian risks of the nuclear program that foresees two more nuclear reactors; urges the European Commission and Council also to investigate seriously the argument of Turkish journalist Sahin Alpay in 2014 that Turkey in essence concluded an agreement with Japan on nuclear cooperation to acquire a nuclear weapon;