Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I propose to take Questions Nos. 54 and 119 together.

On 7 March at the European People's Party congress in Bucharest, Ursula von der Leyen was officially named her party’s candidate for a second term as President of the European Commission. In her first term, President von der Leyen has been a strong advocate for the protection of Irish interests, particularly throughout the Brexit process. The Sinn Féin Party was strongly supportive of President von der Leyen and her stance in respect of Brexit. She also provided important leadership in the EU and support to Ireland during the Covid-19 pandemic and has provided consistent leadership on the EU's multifaceted response to Russia's aggression in Ukraine.

Ireland is currently conducting extensive consultations, both internally and with our European partners, in order to decide which nominee to support in the European Council. There are still a number of factors that need to be taken into account before support for any one candidate can be announced. The outcome of the European Parliament elections at the beginning of June, for example, is a crucial factor for all member states in determining who to support for the role of President of the next European Commission. Following the elections, we must come together in the European Council and propose a nominee, who must then be approved by the European Parliament.

The Taoiseach underlined Ireland’s position on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict during his meeting with President von der Leyen on 11 April, including calling upon the Commission to respond to the request made by his predecessor, jointly with Prime Minister Sanchez of Spain, for an urgent review of Israel’s compliance with its human rights obligations under the EU-Israel Association Council. Since the Hamas attack on 7 October, we have worked to turn the EU's position on Gaza around. Along with others, we have been effective in broadening not just the Commission's response. In terms of the humanitarian response from the Commission, Commissioner Lenarcic has been an exceptional Commissioner who does not get acknowledged enough for his work on the Middle East. There is now a broader understanding across the Commission of our perspective and the perspective of others on the issues, including the violation of international humanitarian law that has occurred and the necessity for Israel to act within that law, which, in our view, it is not doing.

Likewise, we have been particularly effective in our support for UNRWA and other UN organisations. When Israel made allegations against a number of UNRWA staff, quite a number of countries immediately pressed the pause button on their aid to Gaza. We did the opposite and actually increased our aid, announcing a €20 million allocation to UNRWA. That was effective. With other EU member states and countries from outside Europe, we then advocated to restore funding to UNRWA. Many countries have acknowledged that, without UNRWA, we simply cannot reconstruct Gaza. The European Commission, including its President, communicated directly to me and to the then Taoiseach, Deputy Varadkar, the Commission's decision to change its perspective on this matter and restore funding to UNRWA following the report from Ms Catherine Colonna, which gave UNRWA a clean bill of health.

Regarding what transpires after the European elections, we will all be in a better position to assess the likely candidates for a number of positions across the European Parliament, the European Council and the European Commission.

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