- 12 ore fa
The Ring, i grandi dibattiti d'Europa: sicurezza UE, a quale prezzo?
Mentre il Parlamento entra nella pausa estiva, ripercorriamo i dibattiti della stagione: come l'Europa può difendersi in un mondo instabile e reagire ai conflitti oltre i suoi confini?
ALTRE INFORMAZIONI : http://it.euronews.com/2026/07/29/the-ring-i-grandi-dibattiti-deuropa-sicurezza-ue-a-quale-prezzo
Abbonati, euronews è disponibile in 12 lingue.
Mentre il Parlamento entra nella pausa estiva, ripercorriamo i dibattiti della stagione: come l'Europa può difendersi in un mondo instabile e reagire ai conflitti oltre i suoi confini?
ALTRE INFORMAZIONI : http://it.euronews.com/2026/07/29/the-ring-i-grandi-dibattiti-deuropa-sicurezza-ue-a-quale-prezzo
Abbonati, euronews è disponibile in 12 lingue.
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04:49per la nostra prosperità.
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04:55ục complimenti per慢慢ari.
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05:18Che drewoste a livello perdoneo di America.
05:29Now it's time for our viewers to get a real flavor of the European Parliament chamber where members ask each
05:35other questions and sometimes it can get heated.
05:39So let's get started. Lukas Madl, I'm going to ask you to ask the first question to Mark.
05:46Well, Mark Potenga, as a colleague in the European Parliament, how can we make sure that we establish more freedom
05:52for the Europeans to the inside and more strength to the outside?
05:55This is the overall issue of our time, I would say. Europe needs more strength for its civilization, for its
06:01reliability, the diplomatic approach that you obviously do not see from the European side,
06:06while Europe is the strongest diplomatic power given the geopolitical situation today.
06:12So how can we create more strength to the outside and how can we establish more freedom to the inside
06:16for our citizens?
06:17I think that's a very interesting question coming from the center right, who's governing in many governments in Europe and
06:23who is basically limiting the right to protest.
06:25who's limiting the right to strike, who's limiting basically fundamental freedoms of Europeans.
06:32So I would say first thing, please tell the governments of your political group, of your political party to stop
06:39limiting the fundamental freedoms of Europeans.
06:42And secondly, towards the outside, I need, we need, I think, to rebuild European credibility.
06:48And how do we do that? We do that by stopping the double standards, by no longer saying international law
06:55is important for us in Ukraine, but in Palestine we don't care.
06:58International law is important when Russia or Putin violates it, but we don't care when Trump violates international law.
07:05Because if you have these double standards, never ever will other countries take you seriously and never ever will you
07:12be a decent player on the international scale.
07:14Okay, on this, I think you want to follow up.
07:18I mean, there is so much to be said.
07:20I think it was now the fourth or fifth conspiracy theory from Mr. Potenga in today's talk about freedom being
07:27limited in Europe.
07:28There is no part on this planet, no continent, no country where freedom is so much established and so much
07:33defended and strong as it is in Europe.
07:36Obviously, also that we have this debate today, also that extremists have all democratic rights in parliaments in Europe, including
07:45the very European Parliament.
07:46All of this is about freedom.
07:48And then mixing things up doesn't make it better.
07:51Of course, when international law is violated, Europe is the strongest voice speaking about that.
07:56Europe stood strong against Trump's attempt, for example, when it comes to Greenland, and we succeeded in that area.
08:03Europe stood strong when it was not clear whether the terrorists will go that way or the other way from
08:08Trump's side.
08:09He put us in a limbo again, but we didn't follow this pathway of a limbo.
08:14We didn't enter this political battlefield of Trump.
08:16We stood strong, and we managed to succeed more when it comes to the geopolitical tensions given than other parts
08:25of the world.
08:25But, of course, we need more strength to the outside, especially in that field you are doubting, in the field
08:30of our own security, and being able to take care of it.
08:34Mark Maja, you want to react?
08:35And then your question to Lucas Manuel.
08:37Well, I think it's interesting because very often the EPP and central parties, when they don't have an answer, they
08:42say this is a conspiracy theory.
08:43What we see in many countries, like in Germany now, there's a debate even on saying we can't use the
08:48watermelon anymore as a political symbol because it would be anti-Semitic.
08:51This is what we are seeing.
08:53We're seeing this also with action against trade unions in different countries.
08:57So we see that there's a democratic backsliding, which human rights organizations are pointing out in Europe.
09:02You know, it's not some kind of left conspiracy to say that.
09:05But you don't want to see it because it's your governments doing it.
09:07Secondly, what I indeed want to ask now, and I think that's a thing, you say that Europe stands up
09:16for international law, and you quote Greenland.
09:20Europe didn't stand up for international law in Greenland.
09:22It stood up for its own territorial integrity.
09:26That is something very different.
09:28Because when we had to stand up for international law, the illegal war on Iran, you supported it yourself.
09:33When it is about denouncing the illegal occupation of Lebanon by Israel, you supported it.
09:39When the International Court of Justice says that we should sanction Israel as third parties, we have a responsibility, you
09:45refuse it.
09:46So basically, when, you know, the Venezuelan president, whatever we think of him, is kidnapped illegally, and the world globally
09:53condemns this,
09:54saying this is just absolutely not how we deal with, how would I say, with international relations, and this is
09:59a violation of the UN Charter, you supported it.
10:02So this is the issue, these double standards, it's not Europe that has double standards, you know.
10:07It is you, it is the governing coalition of Europe that has these double standards.
10:11Look, who is dealing with international law, who is in the lead of preserving it and observing it, is the
10:18United Nations.
10:18We had yesterday night in the European Parliament's plenary a debate on the United Nations' necessary reform.
10:24The United Nations have to be reformed for obvious reasons, and if you are telling now that the war on
10:33the Iranian regime was wrong,
10:35I say, yeah, it was amateurishly done by the United States, while the decapitation of the Mueller regime's leaders worked
10:44very well.
10:44But the war obviously was wrong, because it didn't work out well, the Mueller regime is still in place.
10:50I have been sanctioned myself by the Mueller regime since 2023, so I know what I'm talking about when I
10:55say women are suppressed in Iran.
10:58Iran is threatening the whole world, not only the region, and of course to threaten our only partner country in
11:05the region,
11:05the only democracy, the only rule of law-based state in the region, Israel, is part of the conspiracy theories
11:11of your political side.
11:12And this is a sign of freedom in Europe, that you can speak freely about that, even if it's a
11:19very much in minority being opinion.
11:23But you are allowed to say that, and there are no many parts on Earth where you can do that.
11:27And last point on Greenland, I mean, when international law is violated, it doesn't matter whether it's Europe's interest or
11:32ours' interest.
11:33We care for international law.
11:34We even want to save international law during these geopolitical times of tensions,
11:39and that means that we have to reform the United Nations.
11:42Okay, thank you for a great debate so far.
11:46We've heard your views.
11:48Now it's time to hear from a new voice.
11:54And for our quote of the week, I would like to bring in Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.
12:00In a letter addressed to Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, she said this.
12:04We cannot justify to our citizens that the EU allows financial flexibility to be used for security and defense purposes
12:13in the strictest sense,
12:15but not to protect families, workers and enterprises from a new energy crisis that threatens to severely impact the real
12:23economy.
12:26Your take on this, Mark?
12:28Well, two things.
12:28First, she's walked back to on her statement.
12:30Secondly, it's terribly hypocritical because the fact that we now have, again, these horrible austerity rules was approved by her
12:39government.
12:39So first, and this is fantastic, first, the far right approves this, or the center right, whatever you want to
12:44call her,
12:45approves these rules, and then they say, ah, it's not fair.
12:48So this is, you know, pure populism.
12:50But what is true is that Europe today says there's no money for your hospitals, for your pensions, for your
12:57schools,
12:57but miraculously we find hundreds of billions for the defense multinationals.
13:03You know, this contradiction is real.
13:04And so, indeed, we do not need these austerity rules anymore.
13:08And once again, they've been imposed by the mainstream parties, including Giorgia Meloni's.
13:13Okay, Lucas Mandel, your reaction.
13:14Yeah, this is part of the extremist populist approach.
13:17I think also the consumers, viewers of this program should see that there is no contradiction between producing something on
13:23European soil
13:24instead from buying it from outside and having hospitals and schools and streets,
13:30because the one thing is connected with the other.
13:33If we have strong prosperity, if we have growth finally in Europe again, we will also be able to afford
13:38the social welfare states.
13:39We have established generations before us have established in Europe, and we will have schools and roads.
13:46And another major issue that dominated the European news agenda this year was the war in Iran and the impact
13:53it's happening on the European Union and also on our economies.
13:56We had a lively debate between the Spanish MEP from the Socialists, Hannah Khalul, and the Austrian MEP from the
14:03European People's Party, Reinhard Lopatka.
14:08As you know, and as my prime minister have stated, we think that any unilateral military intervention that has not
14:16passed through the security against the United Nations is not in compliance with international law.
14:21So we condemn any unilateral attack.
14:26This is not to say that we are supporting the Iranian regime in any case, you know, because we have
14:31been against the Iranian regime criticizing the killing of Masha Amini and, you know, the protesters, you know, in the
14:36streets that were fighting for human rights and their liberties.
14:40And we have always condemned the relation of the Iranian regime with the militias such as Hezbollah or the Houthis
14:48or Hamas.
14:49So very critical with them always.
14:51And we fought to include the Revolutionary Guard in the EU terrorist list.
14:55So a condemnation of the Iranian regime, but also of the U.S.-Israeli intervention.
15:01Mr. Lopatka, do you think that this military intervention from the U.S. and Israel was justified?
15:07I can't agree.
15:09Why?
15:10Because if we would wait until the Security Council of the United Nations is acting, we would never have a
15:16result.
15:17You know, it is blocked by Russia and China.
15:21They always support Iran, whatever is ongoing there.
15:24So don't forget, this regime in Iran, the Mullah regime, is a terrorist regime.
15:31What did they do?
15:32They killed thousands of their own people.
15:36There was state oppression to the Kurds.
15:39There are 8 million Kurds.
15:40Have in mind how they killed Masha Amini some years ago.
15:46They are founding terrorist groups in the region.
15:50Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis.
15:53And they are a big danger also for Europe.
15:56We should not forget it.
15:57It was a diplomat.
15:59He was in Vienna, in our embassy.
16:02Then he was sentenced here in Belgium for 20 years because he was supporting terrorism here on European soil.
16:09So what I want to say is we can speak about international law.
16:16And here you can say maybe it was illegal.
16:19But I think the United States and Israel were legitimized to start with these strikes.
16:27So let me put that argument to you, M.E.P.
16:29He's saying, well, maybe the legality is questionable.
16:33But isn't Europe letting the U.S. and Israel do its dirty work in the Middle East by going after
16:39the proxies,
16:40going after the nuclear and missile programs of Tehran, for example?
16:43Do you agree with that?
16:44Well, what I do think is that we have diplomacy for something.
16:47First of all, we cannot use double standards.
16:50We cannot criticize other aggressions, you know, for other countries.
16:53and then say that this is something we can.
16:56But this is about international law, the system that we gave to ourselves after 45.
17:00So either we believe in international law or we don't believe in that.
17:03And we have means like diplomacy.
17:05Let's remember that one day before the conflict,
17:08even the Iranians sitting in a table of negotiations with the Omanis said that it will work not to enrich
17:15themselves.
17:16We know that and we have investigating and we send inspectors in order to see that it will enrich.
17:22And even if the director of the nuclear agency said a few days ago that they were not sure that
17:28they were building nuclear weapons,
17:31but they had more than 60% of the allowed enrichment of uranium.
17:35So we have been very critical of that.
17:36We were under control.
17:37But don't forget that we have also a deal in 2015 between Iran and six other countries where the U
17:41.S. were within that countries,
17:43even Russia, Russia and China.
17:45And then the U.S. unilaterally deployed afterwards, which had as a consequence Iran enriching much more
17:53and restricting more of the inspections.
17:55So either we have a consensus against Iran on diplomacy, fighting the enrichment on uranium
18:02and targeting any other kind of activities they can have.
18:06Or, I mean, it cannot be unilateral.
18:08We need to go all together and based on international based rule system.
18:11You bring up this question of double standards because the EU does pride itself on upholding the rules based order,
18:17international law.
18:18You said yourself that you question the legality of this.
18:21Yet the EU always is talking about international law in places like Ukraine.
18:25isn't this stable standards from the EU?
18:27No, not at all.
18:28Why?
18:29There's a big difference between the invasion in Ukraine of Russia to take the country,
18:35not respecting the sovereignty, not at all.
18:38And the situation here, the UN charter, and I'm absolutely sure that the purpose of it is to protect human
18:47life
18:47and not to shield terrorist regimes like in Iran.
18:51The Security Council is not working.
18:53So we are in a very difficult situation because I think the bigger threat is when the Security Council is
19:02misused
19:03by regimes like Iran, by dictators like Putin.
19:11And on the other side, we have to do everything to protect the interest of our people.
19:18And fighting terrorism, and Iran is the biggest sponsor of terrorism, giving Israel the chance to survive as a nation,
19:29I think this is our duty, and it's absolutely in the interest of Europe.
19:34So there's a big difference and no double standards, not at all.
19:41As you can see, there are lots of questions, but really hard to find the answers.
19:45Now it's time for us to take a short break here on this special summer edition of The Ring.
19:49Don't go anywhere.
19:50We'll be back soon.
19:59Welcome back to this special summer edition of Euronews Debate Show, The Ring.
20:04I'm Maid McMahon in Brussels.
20:06And as MEPs take a break from the city for the summer and the activities in the European Parliament Institute
20:11behind me take a slow,
20:13We're looking back at some of the highlights of this season on The Ring.
20:17One topic that featured a lot was, of course, the war in Iran and how Europe should respond.
20:22We can take a look now at an excerpt from this edition between Rio Terras, the Estonian European People's Party
20:27MEP,
20:28with Oswald Demariel, a far-left MEP from Germany.
20:35We have seen wars emerge around us.
20:40Europe has not launched any wars.
20:42Europe has not, in the last, like, 70 years, not been part to a war itself.
20:48But we see others attacking European countries around us.
20:52Do you think that Europe can solve these problems diplomatically?
20:56Or do we need military means to back up our diplomatic efforts?
21:02And if not, what is the other way?
21:04To be honest, yes, the European Union, as the European Union, didn't launch wars.
21:10But European member states were also, in the past, part of wars, like we saw in Afghanistan, like we saw
21:18in Iraq, like we saw in Libya.
21:20It was not, UK is not anymore European Union, but it was also European countries.
21:26So it's not true that the European Union in the past was just standing for diplomacy and against wars in
21:33this world.
21:34So if we want to answer the times of wars, we have to go back and to stop about talking
21:40just about militarization.
21:42Do you know the definition of a dialogue?
21:45Yes, sure.
21:45That means that it needs two parts who want to discuss, to talk to each other.
21:50If one side wants to talk and the other one is not, and I have been experiencing myself trying to
21:55reach out to Russian chief of defense, as I was chief of defense, and the response was, why?
22:01Nobody wants to talk to us.
22:02And not the dictator Putin, not Chairman Xi, they don't care.
22:08And as long as we are weak, we are not at the table.
22:12And the dialogue needs two sides.
22:15And if Russia understands only military means, and they did not use diplomacy against Ukraine.
22:21Maybe a reaction on them to that.
22:22I don't know what you mean with weak.
22:24European Union is one of the huge or one of the biggest economic powers of the world.
22:30And also the European member states has a lot of military instruments, and we are spending a lot of money
22:36for military means.
22:38So it's like this.
22:39The facts are on the table.
22:41So don't tell just we are like this or we are like this.
22:45What is happening by now is that the European Union also decided, like the U.S., like China, like other
22:51big powers in this world, that they want to defend its own interests.
22:55And this means resources of the world, trade routes of the world by military means.
23:01And what this means is that people are dying, that the working class all over the world is paying the
23:07bill for it.
23:08And this is not acceptable.
23:09This is why I'm rejecting this military means.
23:12And I'm saying we have to find another way to protect lives, to protect our earth.
23:17There are certain things we cannot do yet that still responds to what we can or cannot do.
23:23So we need to invest commonly together to a drone defense because we have seen a new weapon developing a
23:32disruptive technology which has been used in Ukraine and kills people.
23:36We need, for example, to invest in this kind of technologies in order to make sure that our people are
23:43defended and they are not dying.
23:46Let me say clearly, it's not a solution for nobody to prolong wars.
23:51And it's also like this that not just Putin said, I don't want to negotiate.
23:56It was also like this that the Western countries long, long time said we had no possibilities to negotiate.
24:01We don't want to negotiate.
24:03And this was prolonging this war.
24:07And the result of this war is not good for the Ukrainian people.
24:10So let me say this.
24:13You are from the EPP and you are standing for a conservative politics.
24:17You are in the last weeks.
24:19Your group has really weakened the right of asylum in European Union systems.
24:26And it's like this that the war in Iran also has the result that people had to flee, that they
24:33become refugees and maybe they want to come here.
24:35What is your answer?
24:36Why are you supporting wars or not rejecting wars, not doing everything to stop wars and on the other side
24:43working against people who are affected by these wars and become refugees?
24:47What is your answer on that?
24:48May I start with saying EPP is not launching wars, is not causing wars.
24:53And the only thing EPP stands for is to defend people against the wars which are around us, be it
25:00an Iran regime which has been killing, torturing people 47 years.
25:08Or be it Russia who has never listened to anybody who launched wars since 2008, whose political aims are, who
25:18wants to achieve its political aims by military means.
25:21And just on the potential refugee ways.
25:23Yeah, yeah, I'll come back to that.
25:24And so that is not what we want.
25:27And we want European people to live safely in Europe.
25:32But we are ready to take refugees, but we don't want to have illegal refugees.
25:38We don't want to have economical refugees.
25:40We want to know who is living in Europe and who is not.
25:45And that's what we stand for.
25:46It is now time to move on to our fifth and final round.
25:50Are you ready?
25:54So now it is time for something a little bit different.
25:57I'm going to be asking our MEPs a set of questions.
26:00And you only have the opportunity to answer with yes or no.
26:05So was it a good idea to kill the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei?
26:09Yes or no?
26:11I don't like him, but I don't think that it's illegal and it shouldn't be.
26:17Was it a good idea?
26:18Yes or no?
26:18Yes.
26:19Is the U.S. still a friend to the European Union?
26:22Yes or no?
26:23Yes.
26:24The U.S. people?
26:25Yes.
26:25Trump?
26:25No.
26:26Should the EU be more involved in this war?
26:29Yes or no?
26:30Clearly no.
26:31Yes.
26:32And should European countries increase defence spending?
26:35Yes or no?
26:35Yes.
26:37No.
26:38Should Europe focus on renewable energy?
26:40Yes or no?
26:41Yes.
26:42And manage a mix?
26:44And should NATO be involved if the conflict expands?
26:48Yes or no?
26:49No.
26:50No, I'm against NATO also.
26:52And just a question on European governments.
26:54Should European governments be subsidising energy costs today now to protect consumers?
26:59Yes or no?
26:59Yes.
27:00Yes.
27:01And is Iran a direct threat to European security?
27:04No.
27:05Yes and it has always been.
27:08Okay and have you agreed on anything that you've heard here?
27:14And what about you?
27:15Have you agreed?
27:15I agree that renewable energy is a part of the energy mix.
27:22And you can watch the full episode of that edition of The Ring on Euronews.com.
27:26But that does bring this special summer edition of The Ring to an end.
27:31We'll be back very soon.
27:32But in the meantime do let us know what topics you want us to debate here.
27:35The ring at Euronews.com.
27:37That is our email address.
27:39But for now thanks for tuning in.
27:40Take care and see you soon on Euronews.
27:46We'll see you soon on Euronews.