The plenary session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe was held at the Sejm on November 24-25.
During the opening session in the Sejm Assembly Hall, participants and guests of the assembly were welcomed by Speaker Elżbieta Witek. Also speaking were Senate Speaker Tomasz Grodzki, acting OSCE Chairman-in-Office Foreign Minister Zbigniew Rau and Assembly Chairwoman Margareta Cederfelt. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenski addressed those gathered in the Sejm building via video link. The summit participants discussed, among other things, the role of the OSCE and national parliaments in the face of the war in Ukraine and the prospects for future reconstruction of the country. (…)
In his speech, Senate Speaker Tomasz Grodzki recalled the crimes committed by Russian invaders. – Each of us, looking at the consequences of Russian aggression against Ukraine, must ask ourselves whether we have failed. To some extent, yes, all the goals we had set for ourselves were challenged, violated and trampled upon by one of the OSCE member states,” he noted. The parliamentarians of the OSCE member states, he added, have been obliged by their citizens to seek a way out of this situation and to strive for peace and stability. – We must achieve a just peace today by supporting the struggle of the Ukrainian people. The leaders of the world’s democracies are in complete agreement that the terms of this peace and the timing of the peace negotiations must be set by the Ukrainians themselves,” stressed Tomasz Grodzki. The Senate Speaker also noted the need to settle Russian crimes and punish their perpetrators. (…)
The parliamentarians gathered in the Sejm Assembly Hall were also addressed in a video address by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenski. As he noted, among the international organizations that have excluded Russia from their ranks is not the OSCE. – Why does the terrorist state even after nine months of its continuous crimes still remain one of the members of your assembly? – he asked. Russia’s membership in the Organization, he added, is „an open abuse of all the principles on the basis of which the OSCE was established.” Volodymyr Zelenski thanked representatives of the Polish authorities for the fact that a delegation from Russia was not allowed into Poland for the session of the Parliamentary Assembly.
The second session of the OSCE PC meeting was devoted to responding to the economic and environmental consequences of the war in Ukraine. Among the main speakers of this part of the session were Dr. Joanna Maćkowiak-Pandera, President of the Board of Directors of the Energy Forum, and Senator Kazimierz Kleina, a member of the delegation of the Sejm and Senate of the Republic of Poland to the OSCE PCU. (…)
In addition to the plenary sessions of the OSCE IG, the Polish Parliament building on Thursday and Friday also hosted meetings of political groups, young parliamentarians of the Assembly, as well as meetings of the Ad-Hoc Committee on Migration, the Committee on Counter-Terrorism and the Standing Committee.
source: sejm.gov.pl
