Three MEPs sent a letter to the president of the legislative forum, Roberta Metsola, demanding an immediate investigation into whether three fellow MEPs were guilty of expressing hatred during a debate on women’s rights held in the European Parliament, news.ro writes.

Among the three affected by the request is Romanian MEP Cristian Terhes, who AUR leader George Simion announced in February would head the party’s list in next year’s European Parliament elections.

The letter was seen by POLITICO, and the publication wonders: “You can say almost anything in the European Parliament, but can you always get away with it?”

MEPs Malin Bjork (Sweden, left group), Evin Incir (Sweden, Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats) and Samira Raphael (Netherlands, Renew group) claim in a letter that their three colleagues violated the parliament’s rules on offensive language during debates regarding the ratification of the 2011 Istanbul Convention against gender-based violence. They ask Robert Metzol to investigate the speech of the three from this aspect.

Christian Terhesch, Anders Vistisen (Denmark) and Isabella Adinolfi (Italy) “made statements that we believe are hate speech,” the three MEPs wrote in a letter addressed to the President of the European Parliament.

Christian Terhes entered the current European Parliament running on PSD lists, but he claims to be part of the PNŢCD and associated with the group of European conservatives and reformists in the EP. The other two accused MEPs belong to the “Identity” and “Democracy” groups, respectively, from the EPP (European People’s Party).

“All three of us reacted verbally and asked these speakers during the debate,” the three MEPs wrote. “But we firmly believe that the European Parliament itself must, for its part, put its foot in the door and show that it does not tolerate this type of hate speech right on its premises,” they say.

“The only thing the president can do is authorize their per diems, but the most important thing, of course, is to say they’ve gone too far,” left-wing MEP Malin Björk told POLITICO.

A spokesman for President Robert Metsola confirmed receipt of the letter and added: “We will review this with the plenary services and the Vice President who will be presiding at the time.”

WHAT CHRISTIAN TERCHES AND TWO OTHER DEMPUTATES SAID

Three right-wing MEPs took inflammatory positions related to the culture war during Tuesday’s debate in parliament, POLITICO writes.

In his speech at the plenary session of the European Parliament, Christian Terhesch called transsexual women “men-perverts”. He said legal recognition of transgender women was the “biggest threat to women” and drew a parallel between men who identify as women and men who identify as machines.

The letter, addressed to Roberta Metsola, said the comment was “outright transphobic and constitutes hate speech based on gender and sexual orientation.”

Terhesch told POLITICO he did not receive a copy of the letter. “Any law that allows a man to be recognized as a woman just because he says so is a serious threat and a form of violence against women. I will gladly take a stand to protect the truth and women from this serious form of violence promoted by an aggressive gender ideology,” added the Romanian MEP.

In a speech, Anders Vistisen, a far-right MEP from the Danish People’s Party, blamed the influence of Islam on violence against women in his country, blaming Muslims for “many examples of murder and rape”.

Immediately afterwards, Renew MEP Samira Raphaela, who is a black woman and one of the authors of the letter, took the floor in the semi-circle, saying: “This type of language can promote aggression and attacks on people who, for example, have an immigrant background.” Rafaela called on the vice-president of parliament, Heidi Hautala, who presided over the debate, to “analyze this issue”. Gautala replied that “a reference can be made to an internal rule regarding the respectful behavior of MPs and damage to the reputation of Parliament”.

The authors of the letter claimed that Vistisen’s statement was a “clear example of hate speech” on ethnic and religious grounds.

In an email to POLITICO, Vistisen defended his speech as “fact-based” and said he would “be happy” to present it to President Metzola. “I have not heard anything official either from the administration of the European Parliament or from the president,” he wrote.

In the same plenary debate, Isabella Adinolfi, an MEP from Forza Italia, Silvio Berlusconi’s party, spoke of Italian women being sexually assaulted by Pakistanis, Bengalis, Moroccans or “African immigrants”.

“Adinolfi makes the connection by suggesting that violence against women is a phenomenon that exists exclusively in ‘foreign’ cultures, as opposed to her own ‘Italian’ or ‘European’ culture, even though we know that violence exists in all countries world”. – they condemned three European colleagues in the letter.

“I find it appalling that the far right is so hypocritical that the only time they pretend to care about women’s rights is when they can use women’s rights to attack minorities,” MEP Bjork told POLITICO.

“This attack is definitely an intimidation by green and left-wing colleagues. The violence and bigotry displayed by these colleagues only harms Europe,” Italian MEP Isabella Adinolfi said in response to POLITICO.

Other MEPs also reacted sharply after the debate. French Renew MP Irene Tolleret told POLITICO, “It was terrible.”

MEP Pierette Herzberger-Fofana, a black woman from the Greens group, said she was “appalled” by the words used by the three and believes they should be punished.