Press conference by Sandra KALNIETE (EPP, LV), Rapporteur and Raphaël GLUCKSMANN (S&D, FR), INGE Chair on foreign Interference, including disinformation. This transcription is a result of an automatic result. Please check against delivery.

Strasbourg

press conference

KALNIETE, Sandra (EPP, LV)

fight against hate speech, populism, and fake news on social media (T)

GLUCKSMANN, Raphaël (S&D, FR)

Special committee on Foreign Interference in all Democratic Processes in the European Union, including Disinformation

Foreign Interference, including disinformation: press conference by Sandra KALNIETE (EPP, LV), Rapporteur and Raphaël GLUCKSMANN (S&D, FR), INGE Chair

SOUNDBITE (English), Sandra KALNIETE (EPP, LV), Rapporteur, The proof of the problems is that majority of Europeans and not only the average people, but also those who work in EU institutions, they are not cyber security aware. We are so used to our open society that we are not prepared to defend, to secure, to protect. And this is a problem which has to be changed during next year's report. It's a big report, as chairman said, it's a diagnosis and the rest two thirds its recommendations and I call it medication. What has to be done to cover the law, also with new legislative acts, have to be adopted to change Wild West in digital space.

SOUNDBITE (English), Sandra KALNIETE (EPP, LV), Rapporteur, So in normal rule of law society, because what is a load off line which is not allowed offline must not be allowed online. The level of responsibility should be the same. The threat of foreign interference in all of its forms, including disinformation, manipulation of social media platforms and advertisement systems, particularly political advertising, cyber attacks, threats against and harassment of journalists, covertly political funding and elite capture and cooperation.

SOUNDBITE (French), Rapha&euml;l GLUCKSMANN (S&amp;D, FR), INGE Chair, Thank you very much for being with us today, it is an important day for our committee, but for the European Parliament in general. At the very beginning of my mandate, I asked for the creation of this special committee on foreign interference to put an end to the guilty indolence and naivety of the leaders Europeans.

SOUNDBITE (French), Raphaël GLUCKSMANN (S&D, FR), INGE Chair, For years, Vladimir Putin's regime has been at war with the European Union. But European leaders refuse to see it. Every time we look surprised when we see Russian interference in our countries. However, these repeated attacks are in no way anecdotal or sporadic. They make a system.

SOUNDBITE (French), Raphaël GLUCKSMANN (S&D, FR), INGE Chair, And so, the idea of this commission was to press the pause button and make a diagnosis of the threats to our democracies and make recommendations to deal with these threats. We worked for eighteen months in a transpartisan spirit. The idea is simple: the preservation of our democratic model is not a matter of the left or the right. It's a common matter. It is the most sacred mission that awaits us, which is incumbent upon us, as the elected representative of the peoples of Europe.

SOUNDBITE (French), Raphaël GLUCKSMANN (S&D, FR), INGE Chair, And this democracy is now under attack, what is happening in Ukraine only underlines the conflict between us and Vladimir Putin's regime. And the boundaries that traditionally determine our frameworks of thought have been completely erased. On one hand, there is no longer foreign policy and domestic policy, inside and outside. All borders have been erased as a result of attacks by authoritarian regimes, Russia in the lead.

SOUNDBITE (French), Raphaël GLUCKSMANN (S&D, FR), INGE Chair, And so what we are asking of European leaders is not just external firmness, it is also firmness in the defence of our democratic models. The conflict that has arisen is not simply a conflict between different geopolitical interests. It is a conflict that now crosses all of our cities, our societies. And any naivety, every weakness today is an invitation to aggression.

SOUNDBITE (French), Raphaël GLUCKSMANN (S&D, FR), INGE Chair, For years, cyber attacks have threatened our institutions, hit our institutions. For years, European leaders have been willing to sell their address books, their experience and their prestige to hostile foreign interests. For years, foreign regimes, via companies that are completely subject to the political interests of these authoritarian states, have been investing in our strategic infrastructures. For years the sanctions imposed by the European Union to punish these assaults are extremely weak and not dissuasive. And so what we did in this commission was to diagnose our weaknesses, our vulnerabilities and make recommendations to rearm our democracies.

SOUNDBITE (French), Raphaël GLUCKSMANN (S&D, FR), INGE Chair, How to restore deterrence and what protection is. How can we allow European democracy to be stronger in coping with external shocks. How is it also possible for the press in Europe to survive the shocks of outdated business models. And so, there really is the transpartisan will. There is a revival of an awakening of European democracies and the certainty that if we decide to be powerful, if we decide to be firm, our democratic system has quite resisted these attacks.

SOUNDBITE (French), Raphaël GLUCKSMANN (S&D, FR), INGE Chair, And for that to happen, the political will must be there. And so, our common call is that the recommendations that will be made in this report be followed up very quickly. And our certainty is that the work we have been doing for eighteen months must not stop and it will continue because protecting our democracy is not a one-shot.

SOUNDBITE (French), Raphaël GLUCKSMANN (S&D, FR), INGE Chair, The protection of democracy is a constant effort that requires from each of us a permanent will to preserve the common framework in which our disagreements are expressed. This common framework is our treasure and for too long we have been light, lazy with its treasure. If we don't fight for our democracies, they can collapse. Are they not going to protect them? They can be destabilized. And so, that's the commitment that we made when we created this commission.

SOUNDBITE (French), Raphaël GLUCKSMANN (S&D, FR), INGE Chair, And I really want to thank the rapporteur, who was not a shadow rapporteur, and also the coordinators of the various groups who made it possible for this committee to operate in an atmosphere that put on hold the various differences that weighed on us on many subjects by focusing on the essentials, that is to say who threatens us, how they threaten us and how we can deal with them. And at the end to ensure that our democracies emerge from this conflict better armed and more alive than ever before. So, it's really an honor to have shared these months and six months of work with you.

SOUNDBITE (English), Sandra KALNIETE (EPP, LV), Rapporteur, I would like to thank also you, Rafael, for all that support that we got in our work. And I particularly enjoyed a very constructive atmosphere that we have amongst our shadow rapporteurs across the political groups. And it just underlines how important is the subject of the report that we put aside our red lines and small disagreements. And even on this subject, the report was voted with large support that I hope that it will be supported not only in committee but also in plenary

SOUNDBITE (English), Sandra KALNIETE (EPP, LV), Rapporteur, The chairman of the committee already spoke about the political background, so I have not much words because we are sharing the same position and the same understanding of political situation. What I regret with great, great sadness because it costs lives of people is the fact that, when the Baltic states, eastern European countries formerly dominated by Soviet Union, they raised the alarm that the developments in Russia are going and threatening direction we were dismissed as troubleshooters, like countries having particular attitude to Russia.

SOUNDBITE (English), Sandra KALNIETE (EPP, LV), But if you look to the border: Eastern Europe and Baltic states are the countries the most interested in having Russia as a democratic country, as a neighbour, not being all the time under the pressure. And as I said, let's call a spade a spade: propaganda machinery was not turned on only on February 24 when he attacked Ukraine. It has been working in Europe for decades, already attempting to poison and divide divide our societies.

SOUNDBITE (English), Sandra KALNIETE (EPP, LV), Rapporteur, When we began to work in the committee, and I think that was not only me on this level of understanding, but many of our colleagues, that the most important is disinformation. But then we saw that this information, it's just the visible part of iceberg. It's a body having its nervous system, which are platforms, different cyber tools. And blood circulation system, which is money. And deeper we went, from experts who explained it all to us more, we were aware that this issue is one of the central issues of how to protect our democracy.

SOUNDBITE (English), Sandra KALNIETE (EPP, LV), Rapporteur, A few words about platforms and data market. We have to shed light on the black box of social media platforms, adopting truly binding EUrules for accountability and transparency, particularly when it comes to demonetisation of harmful content about data market. It's not normal. There is some legislation protecting data of individuals, but it's not normal that's loosely regulated international or national companies are harvesting, storing and selling data. And they are selling also to those autocratic regimes who are trying to tear us apart.

SOUNDBITE (English), Sandra KALNIETE (EPP, LV), Rapporteur, Another element is the financial resources, which are used to tear us apart. Different sorts of covert funding, which is intented to avoid the existing either electoral laws or financial legislation regarding NGOs and so on. The problem is that in Europe, of course, it is a national competence, but national legislation defers. There are countries where financing from third countries is allowed. And for instance, in my country, Latvia, it's forbidden. But for some countries where it is allowed, it's so easy to implement the scheme that you're seeing from outside. And then this EU country X transfers money to a country J. There are many more schemes I would present, but you can read about it in the report and the last part.

SOUNDBITE (English), Sandra KALNIETE (EPP, LV), Rapporteur, And the last part I will speak about resilience because resilience really is something what can be implemented only by a whole of society and whole of government approach, because it's a very kind of orizontal covering process. Otherwise we will not be able to build up that shield of defence protection. What we need against those who with foreign interference wants to brainwash and manipulate European minds, and chairman already spoke and I will only touch that foreign interference also is real and we need to capture (intelligible) and set high civil servants. They are serving countries which are not friendly. Russia has its fault, but also in Chinese companies and there are politicians, European politicians, former who are lobbying for them in Europe. I think I said the most important of what I wanted to say to you, so I'm ready for your questions.