#eurojournal

[euro-journal]

The Stress Test of the European Union Continues

European Council President Donald Tusk recently described Britain’s departure from the EU the community's "toughest stress test." Unfortunately, it is not the only one.

Clearly, the Brexit talks are heading for the “no deal” cliff everybody was so worried about all along. Since the United Kingdom is still not willing to talk about the divorce bill in earnest, the EU is now beginning to draw up contingency plans for the possible collapse of Britain’s departure talks. The clock is ticking and a breakthrough is nowhere in sight.

Meanwhile, the chauvinism that fanned the desire of so many Britons to leave the EU is igniting other parts of Europe as well. In the Czech Republic, populist billionaire Andrej Babis won that country’s general election after campaigning on an anti-establishment and Eurosceptic platform. In Austria, conservative leader Sebastian Kurz has invited the far-right Freedom Party for talks to form a coalition government.

This weekend, some sixty thousand nationalist demonstrators marched through Warsaw to mark Poland’s independence day, carrying banners with slogans such as “white Europe of brotherly nations”. Demonstrators chanted “Pure Poland, white Poland!” and “Refugees get out!”, in what experts say was one of the biggest gathering of far-right activists in Europe in recent years. One demonstrator interviewed by Polish state television said he was on the march to “remove Jewry from power”.

This is not the Europe Robert Schuman, Helmut Kohl, and Jacques Delors had in mind.

A petty nationalism of a different kind is unfolding in Spain. Hundreds of thousands of Catalan independence supporters clogged central Barcelona on Saturday to demand the release of separatist leaders held in prison for their roles in the region's banned independence drive. When the regional parliament declared independence from Spain in October, Madrid responded by suspending the region’s autonomy and imposing direct rule.

This is a crisis the European Union really doesn’t need at the moment and Brussels cannot even do anything about it because it is an internal affair of a member state. Europe needs more unity based on shared democratic values, not more separatism based on nationalism.

[euro-journal]

The European Union at Sixty

The Treaty of Rome was signed on March 25, 1957 by Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Germany and came into force on New Year’s Day 1958.

The founding treaty of what was to grow into the European Union was signed in the Palazzo dei Conservatori on the Capitoline Hill of the Città Eterna.

Six decades later the Union has grown from six to twenty-eight member states but only twenty-seven were represented at the diamond jubilee celebration in Rome.

In a few days, Britain will invoke article fifty of a different European treaty to get out. The move will initiate the next stage of the tragedy that has been unfolding since the LEAVE vote in the Brexit referendum of June 2016.

At the celebration in Rome, Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni described Britain’s decision to leave the EU as “closed nationalism” that belongs in the past.

Gentiloni and his twenty-six colleague signed a declaration exhorting peace and unity, and emphasizing the importance of maintaining the Union. “European unity started as the dream of a few, it became the hope of the many. Today, we are united and stronger: hundreds of millions of people across Europe benefit from living in an enlarged union that has overcome the old divides.”

Unfortunately “united and stronger” is mostly wishful thinking. Brexit has thrown the European Project into a deep crisis and all indications are that the British divorce will be acrimonious. A “Nexit” of the Netherlands—a founding member—seems to have been avoided for now but the political climate in France remains volatile a month from the presidential election there. It looks like Marine Le Pen of the extreme right Front National will make it to the second round at least and she favors a French exit from the European Union.

Many observers do not expect her to become president but a majority of experts did not see Brexit coming, either, or the Trump presidency in the United States for that matter. A “Frexit” would certainly spell the end of the EU as we know it.

Even if the Le Pen catastrophe can be avoided—which seems likely—Poland appears poised to take over the UK’s annoying role as the brake van or caboose of the European train. It’s hard to believe that it has been less than five years that the EU was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for its contribution to the advancement of peace and reconciliation, democracy and human rights in Europe.

[euro-journal]

Serious dangers lie ahead as Ukraine crisis escalates yet again!

First came the uprising against Viktor Yanukovych with an attempted crackdown, followed by the Russian takeover of Crimea. 

Now, a civil war looms in the eastern regions of Ukraine, with a possible Russian involvement while western nations are desperately trying to figure out what to do about it all. 

Acting Ukrainian President Oleksandr Turchynov has just announced a full-scale military operation in the east after pro-Russian militants again seized government buildings there. 

Clearly, the new government in Kiev is in no mood to allow a repetition of what happened in Crimea in March when pro-Russian “defense units” suddenly appeared on the peninsula and the local assembly voted to join Russia, a request Moscow quickly obliged. 

As before, NATO has voiced ‘concern’ and the US ambassador to the UN, Samantha Power,  said the attacks this weekend bore the "tell-tale signs of Moscow's involvement." 

Not surprisingly, the Kremlin denies any involvement in the current events in eastern Ukraine.

All of this is potentially very dangerous if Kiev goes ahead and tries to remove the pro-Russian militants in eastern Ukraine by force. How will Moscow react if ethnic Russians are gunned down by Ukrainian government troops?

What will NATO countries do if Putin sends his troops across the border to aid the pro-Russian rebellion? An estimated 40,000 Russian troops have been amassed along the Ukrainian border already.

Even if both NATO and Russia avoid direct military intervention, it could get pretty ugly if the violence continues, one Ukrainian officer has already been killed in a gun battle with pro-Russian militants. 

The West will now intensify the diplomatic efforts but there still aren’t a lot of viable options.

US Vice-President Joe Biden is scheduled to visit Ukraine next week to discuss the latest developments. In the meantime, US Secretary of State John Kerry keeps calling his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov. So far, those phone calls have not resulted in a de-escalation of the crisis.

[euro-journal]

Crimea votes for Russia - what now?

Looks like the crisis in Eastern Europe triggered by the ouster of Ukraine’s Viktor Yanukovych won’t go away any time soon. 

On Monday, the United States and the European Union announced travel bans and asset freezes against a number of Russian and Ukrainian officials. 

It’s a fairly mild response so far, following Sunday’s referendum in Crimea, in which a large majority supposedly voted for leaving Ukraine to join Russia. Pro-Russian forces have been in control of Crimea since late February.

A quick recap: Russia’s leader Vladimir Putin had hoped to keep what he clearly views as EU encroachment in his sphere of influence at bay by making Yanukovych cancel an association agreement with the European Union last year.  

However, that move angered so many Ukrainians that they came to demonstrate in arctic temperatures for weeks on Independence Square in Kiev. When Yanukovych finally sent in his security forces to stop the protests last month, he himself was voted out by the Ukrainian parliament, a move Russia immediately denounced as an “illegal coup.”

Suddenly, the Ukrainian revolution became a direct conflict between Putin’s Russia and the new government in Kiev over the strategically important Crimean peninsula. 

Moscow simply will not accept losing the home of its Black Sea fleet to a pro-western Ukraine which might join NATO and the European Union in the long run. 

Could it come to war over this? 

Unlikely: Ukraine has no realistic military options against Russia and will have to accept whatever annexation Moscow is going to impose, especially, in the absence of western military intervention. 

And there is no real prospect of that, despite the loud protests of the European Union and the United States. 

The US cannot go to war with a nuclear power over this and just got out of two very long and unpopular wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. 

There is certainly no popular support for military action against Russia in the European Union and no desire to return to the bad old days of the Cold War, either.

Peter Baker was right when he concluded in a recent op-ed piece that “ finding powerful levers to influence Mr. Putin’s decision-making will be a challenge for Mr. Obama and the European allies." 

German chancellor Angela Merkel has warned the crisis would cause “massive damage to Russia, economically and politically.”

Economic sanctions would come at a high price for everybody, though: “Russia exported $ 160 billion worth of crude, fuels, and gas-based industrial feedstocks to Europe and the US in 2012.” 

Shutting that off would harm the Russian economy but also be fairly unpleasant for European energy consumers in particular.

Germany’s position is especially delicate here, Berlin’s influence over EU decisions is stronger than ever before, at the same time Russia is supplying a large chunk of Germany’s energy needs, so don’t expect too much here. 

It is feared that Russian counter-sanctions could cost the German economy “upwards of 300,000 jobs.”

We’ll soon find out how serious the US and Europe are about punishing Moscow, at least economically: If Russia is suspended from the G-8 group of leading industrialized nations, the June summit scheduled to take place in Sochi, Russia could be moved to London instead. 

That at least would be a fairly strong signal, and the summit would have a new item on the agenda: the impact of sanctions against Russia on the global economy. 

[euro-journal]

The next EU crisis

This year will reveal whether the European Union is on the way to the next crisis. After a record 18 months of recession in 2012-13, the economy is still struggling, with 26 million people out of work. In Greece, for instance, a whopping 27% of the work force is unemployed, despite the international bailout package.

And now the British government is making threatening noises all too familiar in Brussels.

On Wednesday, Chancellor of the Exchequer (treasury secretary) George Osborne raised the prospect of Britain leaving the European Union if the 28-nation bloc fails to improve competitiveness, create jobs and protect the rights of countries which are not in the single currency.

“Protective rights” in this case could even mean veto rights for national parliaments of member states. 95 lawmakers in Osborne’s own Conservative Party want each state to be able to impose a "red card" if EU rules are seen to be hurting the national interest. So far, the Tory leadership does not actually support this approach.

Yet, it already looks like a blast from the past: in the 1990s then prime minister John Major got an “opt-out” from the single currency during the Maastricht treaty negotiations and Britain has refused to join the eurozone ever since.

There seems to be a deep seated fear that Britain will somehow nevertheless be coerced into joining at some point: Osborne warned Brussels not to put the UK in a position where it has to choose between joining the single currency or leaving the EU.

The chancellor stressed his country’s determination to renegotiate the terms of British membership in order that the UK can remain in the EU following a possible referendum on EU membership which could happen by 2017.

So, once again, it’s opt-out and re-negotiate while London wants more influence with less commitment and more veto rights. And Britain is looking for like-minded allies in other European capitals but the “reform camp” will have to deal with EU countries which favor more integration to combat Europe’s economic malaise.

Latvia just joined the euro and a sizable portion of the Ukrainian population has been demonstrating in arctic weather for closer ties with the EU. Conservatives in Britain seem worried about more and more East European nations joining, they already expect large numbers of Romanians and Bulgarians to flood into Britain.

So, instead of pursuing a common approach to solve Europe’s problems, the various camps will be blocking each other's efforts thus ensuring that the widespread disenchantment amongst Europeans with EU bureaucracy will continue and the necessary collaborative effort bog down as usual.    

The European elections scheduled in May could result in an assembly as powerless as ever, filled with eurosceptics of various stripes because a low turnout will favor the radical fringe determined to make the vote about the European project itself.

It doesn’t augur well that Britain now threatens to revive the fight over the purpose of the European Union when accepting majority rule is the way forward. The EU will be unmanageable and dysfunctional if everybody has a veto on every issue at hand.

On the other hand, if Britain leaves, it will be a heavy blow for the EU, and it could entice other ‘eurosceptic’ nations to follow. So far, the European Union has been expanding with ever deeper integration, should that course be reversed, the result could be a dramatically different Europe.    

[euro-journal]

How NSA spying allegations could impact trade talks between the European Union and the US

Germany will not grant NSA intelligence leaker Edward Snowden asylum – at least for now.

"We will stick to our decision from the summer that Mr Snowden has no right to asylum in Germany because he is not a political refugee," said the interior minister, Hans-Peter Friedrich on Wednesday.

Clearly, the anger over the alleged NSA spying in Europe only goes so far.

But that anger has been rekindled over and over since the spring. The latest flare-up: Britain stands accused of operating a secret listening post from its embassy in Berlin, just yards from the German parliament and Chancellor Angela Merkel’s offices.

This follows hot on the heels of allegations that the American National Security Agency hacked into Merkel’s cell phone.

To some extent, Germans feel betrayed by their closed allies.

In an interview with Germany’s main daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, former Vice-Chancellor  Frank-Walter Steinmeier sums up what many Germans think:

“The data hunger of the NSA seems to be boundless.  The massive surveillance of innocent citizens and EU offices seemed bad enough, but until now we couldn’t even image that there would be spying on members of allied governments.  We can’t just go back to business as usual now. “

Washington is getting at least a little bit nervous about the spying allegations. After President Obama assured Merkel that her cell phone is currently not being tapped by the US, Secretary of State John Kerry  urged Europe not to let NSA surveillance concerns thwart the current trade talks between the EU and Washington.

The second round of negotiations over the ambitious Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) is scheduled to begin in Brussels on Monday, despite calls in Europe to suspend those talks.

Both sides hope for a significant stimulus to their job markets and economies — and both sides can clearly need that while their economies still struggle with poor employment and sluggish growth in consumer spending.

But a wide ranging trade deal requires good faith on all sides and the distrust of the United States is growing in Germany. Steinmeier for one foresees great difficulties for the trade talks if there is no clarification of American surveillance methods in Europe.

[euro-journal]

Europe furious over yet more NSA spying allegations

The political rift between the United States and Europe just got a little wider. 

European anger with National Security Agency (NSA) surveillance activities has been simmering along, and this week it got personal for German chancellor Angela Merkel. 

German news magazine Der Spiegel reported that the NSA had hacked into Merkel’s cell phone. Understandably, Ms Merkel was not pleased and called Washington to clarify the issue. President Barack Obama assured her, the US was not monitoring her calls and would not in future, according to the White House. 

However, it was left open, whether calls had been listened to in the past. This is what Germans call ‘Lauschangriff’ or ‘listening attack’.

Leading politicians and media commentators in Germany expressed serious concern on Thursday following these new allegations.

Germany's foreign minister, Guido Westerwelle called US ambassador John B Emerson to a personal meeting to discuss the allegations.

"The decision to call in Emerson, who has only been the US representative in Berlin since mid-August, is an unusually drastic measure," writes Philip Olterman in the Guardian. 

Merkel’s probable new coalition partner, the SPD, is already calling for the suspension of talks about a free trade zone with the US which started in July.

Elsewhere in Europe, the French Le Figaro called the news "a warning shot in the direction of the US and a call for a resolute response from the EU. Europe is not discovering the NSA wiretapping scandal now but with a personal accusation from Angela Merkel, the matter takes on a spectacular new scale."

On Monday, France also summoned its US ambassador over reports that the NSA had spied on millions of French phone calls. French President François Hollande has called for the issue to be put on the agenda of the next EU summit. 

Italy’s Corriere della Sera has been using the English word ‘datagate’ in its coverage:

"Even if the cell-phone allegation turns out to be false”, writes the Milan-based paper, “it doesn't change anything [...] The real central issue is that a threshold has already been crossed.”

German observers also wryly note how little US media coverage has so far followed this latest revelation:

“Much more important stories are the World Series, the christening of Britain’s Prince George, and life style of Bishop Bischof Franz-Peter Tebartz-van Elst”, reports Jürgen Schmieder in the Süddeutsche Zeitung.

The commentaries are even more vitriolic: “Barack Obama is no Nobel laureate of peace, he is an agent of discord,” writes Robert Roßmann in the same paper. 

Ouch! The European honeymoon with President Obama seems only a faint memory now and the trans-Atlantic rift is growing. 

[euro-journal]

Refugee tragedy in the Mediterranean: the trouble with Europe’s southern border

Malta's prime minister Joseph Muscat has said European waters close to Africa are turning into a cemetery, after another boat full of migrants capsized Friday.

Muscat said his country felt "abandoned" by the rest of Europe and urged the EU to take action. This latest incident followed the sinking of a migrant boat off the Sicilian island of Lampedusa on October 3rd which killed more than 300 people.

The flood of illegal migrants pouring into Europe at the moment looks all to familiar to Americans: According to the Pew Research Center, “unauthorized immigrants made up 28% of all US immigrants in 2012.”

In Europe, more than 30,000 migrants reached Italy on boats from North Africa this year alone, according to the UN's refugee agency UNHCR.

Many in the United States feel that their immigration system is broken and something needs to be done to deal with the approximately 12 million ”undocumented” migrants believed to be in the US. 

A lot of Americans think, the answer is to tighten border security - that goes for Europeans, too. 

At this point, the European Union is thinking of counteracting the flood of migrants with drones and satellites to track refugees at sea. The emphasis does not seem to be on finding ways to save people like those killed near Lampedusa but to keep them out. 

EU Home Affairs Commissioner Cecilia Malmstroem did call for Mediterranean-wide search and rescue patrols to intercept migrant boats.

“But the system for surveilling 'irregular migratory flows', as they are called in the official jargon, is precisely the kind of monitoring apparatus America's NSA intelligence service might dream up”, writes Gregor Peter Schmitz in Germany’s Spiegel news magazine. 

Clearly, that doesn't sound like Europe would like to welcome the huddled, tired masses currently trying to escape crisis-ridden places like Syria, Somalia, Eritrea or Mali. 

Interestingly, the gateway into the EU is Libya at this point. The EU's border agency Frontex says "Libya was the main departure point for migrants heading across the Mediterranean to Italy...because Libya remains plagued by violence, kidnappings and fragmented institutions.” 

Pushing for more immigration is fairly unpopular in Europe and will probably lose you votes, just look at the recent election in Austria where the right-wing Freedom Party did well after accusing the ruling coalition of permitting too much immigration. 

The refugee crisis has also led to misgivings among EU member nations.  

Malta, Greece, and Italy have long made appeals for more assistance for the states that bear the brunt of mass migration.

But northern, more affluent EU nations, such as Sweden, Germany and Denmark, insist they already take a large proportion of migrants. A spokesman in Berlin told German media recently that 65,000 refugees had been taken in last year, compared with 15,000 in Italy.

Echoing the debate in Britain where asylum seekers are often derided as "benefit scroungers", German interior minister, Hans-Peter Friedrich said most of those trying to cross the Mediterranean were "economic" migrants rather than political refugees.

Immigration might be a problem in the United States but so far, the EU has not even been able to agree a common migration and asylum policy as many members are reluctant to cede authority over immigration issues to Brussels.

Many years ago, I studied a radio play called Schiff Esperanza (The Ship Esperanza) as a student in Germany. It features a sea captain who promises to take immigrants illegally to America only to deliver them to a sandbar miles off shore where they drown. 

Now, I have to read about a father watching his son drown in front of his eyes, victims of wars and revolutions, and the European version of ‘coyotes’. 

Esperanza is the Spanish word for hope.