Europe at the crossroads: choose prosperity and peace
The following is a transcript of the speech delivered at the last CPAC Hungary on April 25 in Budapest.
Good morning, everyone.
I am really happy to be back on this stage once again. It is wonderful that Miklos Szantho and the whole team at the Center for Fundamental Rights are working for this fantastic network building of conservatives around the world.
In a month’s time there will be a crucial decision for Europe: continue with the failing coalition of socialists and liberals or bring in conservative and identity forces to tackle European challenges and correct the disasters caused by this European Commission. This European Commission has imposed a radical green agenda on Europe – green houses, stop combustion engines, electric cars – with EU directives to be realized too quickly.
All this is against the interest of European citizens and against European industries: we will spend a lot of money and become poorer.
And economic and industrial power is shifting to China thanks to our own impositions.
We are hurting ourselves with our own hands.
CO2 emissions from European countries account for about 6 percent of total global emissions. China is at 27 percent, the United States at 11 percent and India at 7 percent. Thus, the EU’s green agenda will have no real impact on global CO2 emissions.
An Italian politician, Giulio Andreotti, said decades ago, “Environmentalists are like watermelons: green on the outside, red on the inside.”
The directives of the EU cannot be like the directives of the old Communist Party, which imposed laws from above for the higher interest of society, without real connection to the difficulties and needs of everyday life and without considering the real problems of people.
We need an economy freed from bureaucracy.
Less state interference, especially from the socialist European superstate. Western countries must stand united on all fronts.
The European Union must strengthen its foreign policy, within the framework of existing alliances. We challenge European economic dirigisme and statism, as in the old Soviet regime.
Finally, the EU Commission has failed another important challenge for our Europe: immigration.
Socialists and liberals see immigration as something positive and to be facilitated. But in Africa there are almost 1.2 billion people, in the Middle East 800 million. In the EU we are 450 million. If only 10 percent of the people from Africa and the Middle East moved to the EU, we would have 50 percent more population.
Immigration is a global phenomenon that needs to be regulated. We must welcome refugees, but help others in their places.
My friends, the diversity of European peoples is essential to Europe’s role in the geopolitical challenges ahead. Defending different cultures, histories, traditions and promoting European values is essential for our future: only if we know who we are can we understand where we are going. “Together, we, the people of Europe, toward a bright future, always keeping in mind that deep roots are not reached by frost” (quoting Tolkien).
Only a strong and united Europe of peoples can ensure prosperity and peace for future generations around the world. This is a battle not only for the upcoming European elections in June, but for the next two decades. Let us work together for a new Europe of the peoples and build global peace.
