The campaign leading up to the EU elections next June will put our democracies to the test, said Czech President Petr Pavel, who warned against populism and short-term political gains at a plenary session of the European Parliament on Wednesday.
Pavel, who became president after defeating populist billionaire and former prime minister Andrej Babiš in January’s elections, is confident populism can be defeated.
“The election campaign next year will put our democracies to the test. I hope it will serve as an opportunity to demonstrate that the European democratic spirit is truly alive. We should refrain from simplistic solutions and empty promises,” Pavel said during the plenary session.
“The temptation to manipulate realities for short-term political gain will be enormous. We all have a huge responsibility to articulate problems as they really are. My presidential election campaign has proved that populism is not the only vehicle to electoral success,” he reminded.
The president also reiterated that EU elections will be accompanied by disinformation, spread with the help of algorithms and artificial intelligence. According to Pavel, the EU should be prepared for such a scenario, for example, by engaging with companies that dominate the digital space.
Pavel advocated actively protecting democracy and strengthening ties with European and transatlantic allies.
“We should suppress rivalry and instead encourage an even closer cooperation to preserve our common values. The values are not limited to any country or continent. A worldwide alliance of democratic countries can make us stronger and more resilient to even more prominent threats like climate change and disinformation,” Pavel said.
He also called for continued support for Ukraine and said Europe should not make concessions to Russia. “Russia must be defeated in Ukraine. And it must withdraw from Ukrainian sovereign territory,” said Pavel, a former head of NATO’s Military Committee.
(Aneta Zachová | Euractiv.cz)
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