"I am not an MEP, but if I were, I would vote for Edward McMillan-Scott as EP Vice-President for the reasons below:
- He is one of the most experienced MEPs, first elected for Yorkshire UK in 1984
- He is the longest-serving member of the European Parliament (EP) Foreign Affairs Committee
- He used his role as Vice-President in the last five years to fight for human rights and democracy in the world (especially in China, Tibet, Africa, Cuba and the Arab world)
- He founded the European Democracy Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR), a fund of €140 Million per year, which helps to develop democracy and civil society worldwide
- He is the co-founder of the International Movement of Parliamentarians for Democracy
- He was elected to chair the EP's largest-ever election observation missions, to Palestine’s presidential and parliamentary elections in 2005 and 2006
- He was the only European politician invited to speak at opposition leader Gary Kasparov's "Other Russia" launch conference in Moscow
- He helped to put children's rights on the EU political agenda, with campaigns for better child abduction rules and initiated the EP decision calling for a Missing Child Alert for Europe
- As Vice-President, he was responsible for relations with the 27 national parliaments of the EU (Cosac) and with the Euro- Mediterranean Parliamentary Assembly, representing the EP at almost all scheduled meetings
- He founded the "European Year of Tourism" in 1990 as the EP's first tourism rapporteur
- He is a patron of the BBC World Service Trust, which trains journalists worldwide
- He speaks English, French, Italian and some Spanish and German "
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Willy Fautré Director, Human Rights Without Frontiers International
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