Polish MEP Michał Tomasz Kaminski called on EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton to step up Europe’s efforts to designate Hezbollah a terrorist organisation after last week’s Bulgarian’s report that the Lebanese group was behind the terrort attack on Israeli tourists in Burgas in July 2012.
In a written question to Ashton, ahead of Monday’s meeting of the EU Foreign Ministers where the issue is likely to come under discussion, he asked why the EU remains “reluctant to call Hezbollah by its proper name”, after Ashton’s official response to the Burgas findings expressed “the need for a reflection over te outcome of the investigation”.
Ashton’s spokesman further conceded that outlawing the group, which the EU has long remained resistant to doing despite Israel and the US having long designated it a terrorist group, was merely one of “several options” the EU had to consider.
Calling for further clarification on the other available options at its disposal, Kaminski, who is a member of the Conservative group in the EU parliament, contended that “our failure to properly define Hezbollah allows the terrorist group to operate in Europe and use our member states as bases for money-laundering and fundraising”. He further quoted EU’s counterterrorism coordinator Gilles de Kerchove who said that committing a terrorist attack was “not the only legal requirement that you have to take into consideration, it’s also a political assessment of the context and the timing”.
The EU has long maintained that Hezbollah makes a positive contribution to Lebanese society as its political wing forms part of the governing coalition.
Despite Israel’s insistence in the immediate aftermath of last July’s Burgas bombing that “we have real hard evidence that the one who stands behind this attack (in Burgas) is Hezbollah (backed by) the Iranians” with then Israeli foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman telling EU officials on a visit to Brussels “it’s unacceptable that Hezbollah terrorists meet and talk with western diplomats in Beirut on the one hand and pursue terrorist activity on European soil on the other hand”, Cypriot foreign minister Erato Kozakou-Markoulis insisted there was “no consensus among EU member states” for outlawing the organisation.
However, she conceded that the EU would consider outlawing the organisation “should there be tangible evidence of Hezbollah engaging in acts of terrorism”, stressing that “EU action to fight terrorism is not limited to that”, rather it comprises “measures on prevention, protection, pursuit and response”.
The EU has found itself occupying an increasingly isolated position in light of the Bulgarian findings released last week, with Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Ron Prosor telling the Security Council Tuesday that Europe’s insistence on drawing distinctions between Hezbollah’s military and political wings was “an exercise in futility”. “The only "difference" between these two wings is that the political wing negotiates the sum of drug cartel money that the military wing later uses to purchase weaponry. It does not take a Nobel Peace Prize laureate to realize that we are not exactly dealing with a selfless humanitarian organization,” he added.
Calling on the EU to “find the moral and political courage to place Hezbollah on its list of terrorist organizations”, he contended that “it must send a clear message that Hezbollah can no longer target its citizens with impunity. The voices of the victims of Hezbollah terror call on us to take collective action - and work together to bankrupt the world's most dangerous "charity".”
A White House statement further commended the Burgas conclusions for exposing Hezbollah as “a terrorist group that is willing to recklessly attack innocent men, women and children, and that poses a real and growing threat not only to Europe, but to the rest of the world”, as it issued a more measured called to the EU than its Israel allies “to take proactive action to uncover Hizballah’s infrastructure and disrupt the group’s financing schemes and operational networks in order to prevent future attacks”.
An additional statement by US State Department spokesman Victoria Nuland clarified: “So we have long designated Hezbollah, as have some others. Our concern is that in the context of our squeezing them, they look for other places to do their banking, to do their plotting, et cetera, and our concern has been that Europe has been one of the places that they have exploited, if you will. And we’ve been in conversation with EU countries bilaterally, with the EU collectively. As you know, it’s a 27-nation organization; they like to take these decisions together. So our hope and expectation is that this clear evidence of Hezbollah operation on European soil will be galvanizing to their internal conversation.”
Kaminski has by no means been the sole European parliamentary critic of the EU’s reticence to definitely act on the Hezbollah threat, after German Christian Democrat and parliamentary foreign affairs committee chairman Elmar Brok was quoted in German daily Hamburger Abdendblatt that the group “belongs on the EU terror list”.
German federal politicians have also instigated calls for the position to come under review, with Free Democratic Party MP Rainer Stinner saying that if claims Hezbollah’s leadership had actively planned the terror attack could be substantiated, “then this organisation must be included in the list of terrorist organisations”.
Ruprecht Polenz of the CDU, who chairs the foreign affairs committee in the Bundestag, added that “should the accusations against Hezbollah harden that the group was responsible for the attack in Bulgaria, I would be for a common EU move to list Hezbollah as a terrorist organisation”.
In the EU, only Holland lists Hezbollah as a terrorist group since 2004 and is pressing the other EU member states to follow its example.
Dutch Foreign Minister Frans Timmermans considers the Bulgarian findings as a confirmation of the Dutch position that Hezbollah is a terrorist organization
"The EU will discuss what consequences we attach to that. It is the first time that an EU Member State establishes that Hezbollah is guilty of a terrorist attack on European territory,” he said.
Britain only blacklist Hezbollah's armed wing.