German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 19/215, pp. 27092-27093.
Frau President. Right honorable ladies and gentlemen. Dear colleagues.
Steffi Lemke (Greens): That’s “Frau Präsidentin”! Deal with it!
– Generic masculine. All of it is in order.
Steffi Lemke (Greens): Nein! It’s “Frau Präsidentin”!
It is all the German language. Dear colleagues, when you become so agitated, then I notice: I somehow seem to have touched a nerve with you, that you have a problem with the German language.
Steffi Lemke (Greens): You have a giant problem with women! You have no understanding with women, that is your thing!
This must for
once be stated clearly. The German language offers many possibilities, and I
choose the correct one.
In Myanmar,
the military has by means of a putsch returned to power. Demonstrations were
mercilessly beaten down, today alone 38 deaths have been reported, many severely
and most severely wounded – an oppressive situation, for the people of Myanmar,
the former Burma.
The great majority
of the people support Aung San Suu Kyi. I could experience how it goes in
Myanmar, as I was there as a private person for several weeks. Merchants and
tradesmen in Rangoon, restaurant leaseholders and fishermen on the Inle Lake,
teachers and workers in New Bagan – I spoke with people of quite different
social classes. An impressive majority support Suu Kyi. Most of them have
pictures of her in their homes, at work. She is the legitimate head of government.
Quite clearly, that was the feeling – of the people in the country, not in a party
central office, not in a German foundation, not in an NGO, but of the normal
people in Burma or Myanmar.
Aung San Suu
Kyi has a strong standing amongst the people. She is the daughter of the
freedom hero Aung San and she has acquired her own reputation as a hero of
freedom – years long house arrest, at the time, under a leftist military
dictatorship.
Margarete Bause (Greens): A “leftist military dictatorship”?
Her 1991
Nobel Peace Prize, conferred expressly for her commitment to human rights, she
could not personally receive – house arrest, travel ban.
What as idol
she was then, even for the old parties, and how she has been forsaken in recent
years by the old parties. The democratically legitimated election winner in
Burma was in foreign countries overloaded with expectations which no one,
absolutely no one, can fulfill. Typical of the Greens and the left-greens: To
expect from all others superhuman accomplishments, yet themselves to accomplish
nothing.
To govern in
the multi-ethnic state of Burma, in forced cooperation with the Communist
military, that is highly complex. To govern in Burma is not as simple as in
Prenzlauer Berg, Berlin-Mitte or München-Schwabing; for a brief moment, to save
the world over Latte Macchiato and Prosecco. Yet in the leftist hyper-morality,
it is all the same.
The old
parties and the Federal government mistake the realities of the world. In
common with other leftist governments, they wanted to compel Aung San Suu Kyi
and her government to naturalize, in a moment, more that one million Bengalis,
people who do not belong to the Staatsvolk,
people whose families often do not come from Burma, who shall be artificially
made into citizens of the state. The diplomatic barrage pertaining thereto was
ardently stirred up by an Islamist block of states in the United Nations, and
in which the Federal government has been complicit. This weakened the
legitimate Burmese government. And now there is a leftist military
dictatorship, a Communist dictatorship under a tight bond to the Communist
leadership in Peking. The old parties gathered here in the Bundestag must let
themselves ask how much responsibility they bear for this bloodshed.
A possible
solution for Myanmar could lie in the ASEAN states’ policy; exceptionally, I am
here of an opinion with Herr Maas. The Southeast Asian states are seeking to
pacify the conflict in Myanmar; for they have an interest in that Myanmar
remain a strong partner – against Chinese influence and also against the Communist
military. The solution therein is not the green-leftist claims which are
unrealistic and incapable of being fulfilled.
The AfD is
the only delegation that consistently and nevertheless not uncritically stands
by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Suu Kyi. Even Aung San Suu Kyi cannot work a
miracle, but a majority of her Staatsvolk
acknowledge her policy. The leftist governments of Europe have abandoned this
woman, the United Nations have abandoned her, the Federal government has
abandoned her.
Would that it
be otherwise, that the military not be trusted to lay hands on the fragile
plant of democracy in Burma. Yet the Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu
Kyi was left alone. She is and remains the hope of all democrats. We, the AfD
delegation, stand at the side of the peaceful democrats in Myanmar.
[trans: tem]
