THE WEEK IN STRASBOURG:EUROPE'S POLITICIANS didn't confine themselves to mere continental concerns this week, with the parliament in Strasbourg launching the Galileo satellite navigation system, criticising China's policies in Africa and sympathising with rising food prices in Asia and the Caribbean.
China's aid and investment policies in Darfur and Zimbabwe were criticised by a report adopted by the parliament. No-strings-attached investment policies meant that China was effectively funding conflicts and abuses in Africa, the report noted.
MEPs also heard a personal account of China's policies in Tibet from Gyaltsen Drolkar, a Tibetan nun who says she was arrested in Lhasa in 1990, when she was 19 years old, for demonstrating for more religious freedom.
Initially jailed for four years, Ms Drolkar said the Chinese authorities increased her sentence by eight years because she had sung protest songs in prison.
Speaking through a translator, she told a press conference in Strasbourg that she was beaten regularly and given electric shocks during her 12 years in detention.
Irish MEP Brian Crowley called for China's help in fighting human rights abuses in Burma. He said the EU "must demonstrate that international interest in, and concern for, the problem in Burma was not just a passing phase last September but that we have a real long-term commitment".
Marian Harkin released a report about the value of volunteering, and Mairead McGuinness stood up for Irish farmers during a debate on the world food crisis. Farmers need more of an incentive to grow more crops, she said.
"Farmers will only increase production if it is profitable to do so," she said. "Just as food prices are rising on the back of increases in commodity prices, so too are the costs at farm level. Fertiliser prices are up dramatically. Energy costs, the key in many sectors, are also pushing up farm production costs," she said.
The parliament gave the green light to Galileo, Europe's satellite navigation system, authorising the launch of 30 satellites between 2008 and 2013 at a cost of €3.4 billion, which is seen as a fair price to pay to ensure European motorists won't rely on US satellites to find their way between, say, Brussels and Strasbourg.
The newer members of the EU traded blows over attempts to set up a visa waiver scheme for EU travellers to the US. Italy and Greece are annoyed with attempts by some nations to negotiate a separate visa scheme with the US. Bilateral agreements are completely unacceptable, said Italy's Claudio Fava, because they dilute the EU's bargaining power.
Greece's Dimitrios Papadimoulis went further, labelling US negotiations with individual states "very offensive to the EU".
The Czech Republic's Jana Bobosikova did not see a problem with her nation's talks with the US, and said if the EU really wanted to stop terrorists blowing up planes, they should stop punishing those trying to thwart terrorism through data-sharing agreements.
President Danilo Turk of Slovenia visited parliament to slap the EU on the wrist for not displaying enough global leadership, especially on climate change and human rights. EU nations must promote the benefits of immigration, perhaps by promoting successful immigrants on television, he said.
MEPs also tackled organ shortages and "transplant tourism" by calling for an EU-wide donor card, and even a non-donor card, to make the suitability or unsuitability of your organs clear to emergency workers in the unfortunate event of your death.
Parliament also looked at its finances, voting to repay clear examples of expenses fraud, and agreeing that parliamentarians should stop using their staff allowances to hire family members.