EU Parliament, Strasbourg, P10 CRE-REV(2026)07-08(3-0290-0000).
Herr President.
Europe stands before an explosion of drug criminality and we experience
a record availability of illegal drugs. The EU meanwhile has overtaken
the U.SA. as the largest cocaine market, and at Eurojust [European Agency
for Criminal Justice Cooperation] the number of cases in only five years –
only five years – has risen 60 percent; drugs worth 20 billion euros were
seized. More than half of Europe’s most dangerous criminal networks are
active in drug smuggling, two-thirds employ violence, over 70 percent use
corruption so as to influence officials and port personnel.
This is no longer a side issue; this is a security policy total failure. Europol
itself states: The networks which smuggle drugs to Europe are largely the
same criminal structures which also organize illegal migration and
human trafficking. The cartels have long since understood: Europe’s
open borders and its political coddling is their business model.
Our ports may no longer be gateways for drug cartels, and our borders
may no longer be business models for traffickers. The solution is simple,
that is to say: Secure exterior borders, destroy trafficking networks and
stop illegal migration.
[trans: tem]
