On Friday 17 April, in the resolution adopted on the response to the pandemic, MEPs condemned the emergency measures restricting civil liberties that have been taken by Hungary and Poland in response to COVID-19 (see EUROPE 12469/2).
In two passages of paragraphs (36 and 37) put to the vote separately, and approved each time by at least 405 elected representatives, MEPs deem it “totally incompatible with European values, both the decision from the Hungarian Government to prolong the state of emergency indefinitely, to authorise the Government to rule by decree without time limit, and to weaken the emergency oversight of the Parliament, and the steps taken by the Polish Government—namely changing the electoral code against the judgment of Constitutional Tribunal and provisions laid by law—to hold Presidential elections in the middle of a pandemic”.
MEPs support the principle of using “sanctions”, especially budgetary ones, as a tool to place pressure on the two countries.
The European Commission was also invited to continue examining the conformity of these emergency laws with European law, as requested regarding Hungary by David Sassoli in a letter sent to Ursula von der Leyen (see EUROPE 12460/20).
Read the letter here: https://bit.ly/2RM318M
Approving an amendment tabled by the Greens/EFA and GUE/NGL groups on reproductive and sexual rights, the European Parliament also condemned “any attempt to backtrack on the reproductive and sexual health and rights of LGBTI people”, as well as “attempts to further criminalise abortion, stigmatise people with HIV, and hamper young people's access to sex education in Poland as well as infringements of the rights of transgender and intersex people in Hungary”.
The Parliament Civil Liberties Committee, which will be attended by Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders, will look once more at the Hungarian and Polish cases on Thursday 23 April. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)