Nathalie GRIESBECK (ALDE, FR), Chair of the Special Committee on Terrorism, Monika HOHLMEIER (EPP, DE) and Helga STEVENS (ECR, BE), rapporteurs, speak to the press about the findings and recommendations to combat terrorism in the EU, in the European Parliament in Strasbourg.

Strasbourg

STEVENS, Helga (ECR, BE)

fight against terrorism (T)

press conference

GRIESBECK, Nathalie (ALDE, FR)

HOHLMEIER, Monika (EPP, DE)

Findings and recommendations to combat terrorism in the EU: extracts from the press conference by Nathalie GRIESBECK (ALDE, FR), Chair of the Special Committee on Terrorism, Monika HOHLMEIER (EPP, DE), and Helga STEVENS (ECR, BE), rapporteurs

Cutaway of the tribune while giving the floor for the press conference to start

SOUNDBITE (French), Nathalie GRIESBECK (ALDE, FR), I thank you you all for your presence here in the European Parliament. We had yesterday at the heart of Strasbourg an awful attack. At the moment, the prosecutor in Paris has confirmed there was a terrorist attack which left three people dead and 12 injured.

SOUNDBITE (French), Nathalie GRIESBECK (ALDE, FR), To show the resilience of the European Parliament by adopting this Rapport and, given the circumstances due to the attack last night, also its political responsibility in this area, show its willingness to go further, which is an august area for Member States.

SOUNDBITE (Dutch), Helga STEVENS (ECR, BE), We are all very happy today that now we can show that the work of this Committee has been finalised. The work in itself, our recommendations in the report, that all of that, we would like to send to all national governments and to the European Commission. We would like them to follow up on this, is very important this report should be studied, and taken on board by European and national authorities.

SOUNDBITE (Dutch), Helga STEVENS (ECR, BE), This sort of information is very important. Sharing data between the various intelligence services, the database sharing is very important. So we would ask the European Commission to assess how these systems can be improved to be able to identify and verify people, who are renting motor transport to get around. We want to deal with the loopholes. For the moment, there is no particular system to ensure effectiveness of dealing with the screening of the radicalised people.

SOUNDBITE (German), Monika HOHLMEIER (EPP, DE), In this report this Parliament decided that we would like the European commission to come up with a new document. So that we do not have 28 different database systems. As so we do not know what we can use and send to another countries. But we have similar standards and we have one set of rules. Secondly, we also decided that the interoperability has to be pushed forward as quickly as possible. We cannot have any blocks in the system, databases should be not interoperable, thereby wasting time.

SOUNDBITE (German), Monika HOHLMEIER (EPP, DE), We would like the European Union to support the local social project initiatives. Obviously, we need good integration and that is why we have the European resilience prize. But these organisations should be given praise for what they are doing as far as integration is concerned, social and cultural integration. Because is only if we seriously try and promote a peaceful background, we will be able to fight extremism. Without the people on the ground, we will not be able to do anything. You cannot deal with this just with police authorities.