Tuesday, 12 June 2012 - Strasbourg

Pino Arlacchi (S&D ). - Mr President, can I say to Mrs Ashton that I largely share her view of the Syria crisis and I share in particular her stress on the Annan Plan as the only viable solution on the ground for this crisis.

I do not agree with those colleagues who dismiss this plan so easily in just a few words. If anyone has any better ideas to lay down in an intractable crisis like the Syrian one, then please do tell us what should be done.

I also do not agree with colleagues who very superficially ask for military intervention – a sort of second Libya solution with NATO intervention and so on – in a completely different situation, after the disasters we have just suffered and are still suffering due to this kind of solution. The Libyan crisis was a typical crisis that can only be solved through international intervention, with the Blue Helmets and with a large mandate to separate parties and to stop violence that comes mostly from tyrannical governments that will one day have to answer for these crimes to the international courts.

In tandem with this, we have violence by rebels using heavy armaments who are funded by foreign countries and who are armed through covert operations. We do not know enough about this and we are not speaking enough about this component. This is a fourth reason why the only solution is the one that Mrs Ashton outlined.

[source:www.europarl.europa.eu]