Eric Byrne (Dublin South Central, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister and, to get straight to the point, I would like him to answer a couple of questions. We are looking at Europe through the eyes of a small island nation, and then we have the bigger conflicts in the greater world.

Would the Minister agree with me that the last thing the world required was the shooting down by Turkey of a Russian jet on the border with Syria? As a result of the tragic events that unfolding vis-à-visthe downing of a Russian passenger aircraft over Sinai by Daesh and the systematic slaughter of Russians and Chinese in Bamako by those fundamentalists, I suspect the hope was that there would have been a unified world response to the activities of Daesh. What are the Minister's views on the newly developing relationships, given the downing of the Russian fighter jet? Does he believe it will further embolden the Russians in the other regions of the Eastern Partnership, for example? I will not detail them all now but there were allegations that the Russians have been messing about again in South Ossetia and Transnistria, with both countries retaliating, and that there were counter retaliations in the form of blocking wine and agriculture imports. Does the Minister believe that as a result of the downing of this plane, a wedge is being driven through what was developing as world opinion on what Daesh was all about?

Does the Minister share my concern that Europe is in a dodgy state? We have just seen an attempt to form a new government in Portugal, which may or may not survive. We have seen a general strike in Greece, orchestrated by the trade union movement and supported by Syriza. British representatives appeared before the Joint Committee on European Union Affairs this morning complaining about their membership of Europe and discussing immigration. They said that 300,000 immigrants annually is too many and they want to consider putting a proposal to their people to withdraw from the European family.

With all our existing problems in Europe and the additional dimension of the movement of migrants, will the Minister confirm that while Ireland has contributed €3 million to address the problem of the unfolding Ethiopian famine, in terms of the undercurrent of emigration, many Eritreans have been coming in under the radar because of the dictatorship in Eritrea? Eritrea has a population of 6 million or 9 million people. Its neighbour, Ethiopia, has a population of 94 million or 95 million people. Does the Minister believe we could contain that flow of people from Africa if famine and poverty is reinforced in Ethiopia?

I compliment the Minister's Department because I had occasion to deal with its officials regarding the Libyan students studying here whose government scholarships were interrupted because of the divisions in Libya. I thank the Department for intervening effectively and reassuring the Libyan representatives here that it was familiar with their problem.

I have put a few awkward questions to the Minister but on another Eastern Partnership country, Moldova, and it is not just a Transnistria issue, the corruption in Moldova has resulted in the collapse of a government. The biggest political party, the Socialist Party of Moldova, is almost a copy of Putin's party. It is so pro-Russian as to represent extreme dangers for Europe.

I have a final question for the Minister. He said that he felt the situation in Ukraine was stabilising but is he up to date on what is happening in Crimea and the role of the volunteer brigades working in conjunction with the Right Sector and now the Tatars? Is he being serious when he says the situation is becoming more stable?