Patricia Stephenson (Social Democrats)
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I wish to touch on the question of safeguarding in the context of EU battle group missions. We know a lot about the different safeguards that come with a UN deployment. UN missions are a whole holistic thing that include safeguardings, the monitoring of human rights violations and ensuring missions are compliant. Mr. Andrews mentioned in his earlier interventions that the EU’s international law would be a safeguard. I am concerned because the EU is currently not meeting its international obligations vis-à-vis trade with the occupied territories, for example, and the ICJ ruling. Therefore, can we trust that as a legitimate safeguard? I would love to be able to trust that concept as a safeguard, of course. Can we trust it as a safeguard for EU battle groups when the EU is already demonstrating a failure to commit to meeting those obligations?