Brussels, 12/03/2013 (Agence Europe) - On 11 March, Marietje Schaake MEP (ALDE, Netherlands) called on European leaders to add “the terrorist organisation Hezbollah” to the European list of terrorist organisations. “It is time to put Hezbollah on the terrorist list”, she said in a written question to High Representative of the EU for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Catherine Ashton and to the Council on 11 March. She added that “the EU should take a clear and credible position, and cut every link in the chain of terrorist activities of Hezbollah”.
“Internal divisions between EU member states give Hezbollah the freedom to continue its unmistakably terrorist and destabilising activities. By placing Hezbollah on the EU list of terrorist organisations all doubts about the legitimacy of the group will be removed and its financial means coming out of the EU will dry up”, Schaake stated. In her opinion, the fact that the political wing and the military wing of Hezbollah are in the hands of the same person makes it difficult to distinguish between legal and terrorist activities.
The whole organisation is banned in the Netherlands, as is the military wing in the United Kingdom. However, other member states are more reluctant to ban it, pointing to the work of the political wing in Lebanon. (CG/transl.fl)