Eu politics

Sweden must copy France’s approach to Islamic intolerance

There are 960 miles as the crow flies between Paris and Stockholm, but when it comes to dealing with Islam they are separated by light years. In France this week there has been something of a kerfuffle caused by a Gap back-to-school campaign that features a young girl in a hijab. One female MP from Emmanuel Macron’s ruling La République en Marche party said the campaign left her ‘sickened,’ while Marlène Schiappa, the gender equality minister, has demanded an explanation from Gap, saying: ‘You don’t choose to wear the veil at nine to ten years old.’ Incidentally, France has looked on in bemusement at Boris Johnson and his comments about

Forced marriage is the MeToo generation’s ‘no go’ subject

By now you’ve probably heard of Marie Laguerre. The 22-year-old student was punched in the face last week by a passer-by, a sickening attack that was caught on CCTV and has since gone viral. It’s caused uproar around the world, and is being seen as evidence of the physical and verbal abuse with which Frenchwomen have to contend all too often. Laguerre was struck because she gave short shrift to the obscene comments of a man who crossed her path on a busy Parisian street. Marlène Schiappa, France’s gender equality minister, described the incident as an assault on the “freedom of women”; Schiappa deserves much praise for her dominant role in

Has Donald Trump finally met a European leader he can work with?

Donald Trump has finally met a European leader he can stand for more than a moment: Italy’s bookish new premier, Giuseppe Conte. The former law professor, who was plucked out of obscurity by 5Star’s Luigi Di Maio and the League’s Matteo Salvini to be the nominal consensus pick of Rome’s anti-establishment government, is the kind of European Trump can do business with. Or at least that is Trump’s hope. For the brash billionaire, Europe has been nothing but a nuisance. Despite his proclamations of having a terrific relationship with Germany’s Angela Merkel and a kinship with France’s Emmanuel Macron, it is not difficult to see through the facade. Relations between

Douglas Murray

Elin Ersson’s ‘citizen-activism’ comes at a heavy price | 31 July 2018

Last week, a 22-year old Swede called Elin Ersson made headlines around the world for her ‘citizen-activism’. Learning that a failed asylum seeker from Afghanistan was to be deported from her country, she bought a seat on the plane that was due to take him part of the way back home (as far as Turkey). Once she was on board the plane Ersson refused to sit down. Filming the whole thing on her mobile phone (natch) Ms Ersson insisted that to send the failed asylum-seeker to his home country would be consigning him to ‘death’ because Afghanistan is ‘hell’. After about 15 minutes of this Ms Ersson got her way.

Michel Barnier is wasting Theresa May’s time

How utterly predictable. As I wrote here on 5 July, Michel Barnier’s ‘considered’ judgement has been to pour a very large bucket of eau onto Theresa May’s carefully-crafted proposals to try to reach a compromise with the EU. Her time, her officials’ time and the time her cabinet spent at Chequers was utterly wasted. Barnier was always going to turn his nose up at whatever Britain proposed. It has been clear for months that that is his strategy: to stonewall all proposals put to him by Britain in the hope that he will be able to bounce Britain into a bad deal (for us) at the last moment. Just read his statement:

The EU’s migration solution? Throw cash at the problem

When European leaders met earlier this month to thrash out an agreement on  migration, they succeeded in rescuing German Chancellor Angela Merkel from the precipice. But it is already becoming clear that the deal they struck was more a temporary papering over of ideological differences on migration than a permanent solution. While the EU agreed on the possible establishment of migrant transit centres on European soil, disembarkation platforms in north Africa, and a general statement that illegal migration was a European problem, the detail of how all this would work in practice was ignored. Not a single European country volunteered to host a reception centre, and attempts to persuade governments in north

Gavin Mortimer

What the Benalla scandal reveals about Macron’s failing presidency

The feel-good factor Emmanuel Macron hoped would surge through France following their World Cup win has failed to materialise. The president milked the success for all it was worth but he has been swiftly brought down to earth with a bump. It was actually more of a thump, administered by his now ex-chief bodyguard Alexandre Benalla, who was caught on camera beating a protestor while dressed as a policeman during a May Day march earlier this year. Since the story broke eight days ago, it has dominated the French media. Had the president’s people come clean the day the footage was first broadcast by Le Monde, the story wouldn’t have developed in

How a Swedish student’s protest against forced deportation could backfire

If the Sweden Democrats, an anti-immigration party, triumphs in the country’s general election on 9 September it won’t be thanks to Vladimir Putin, no matter how many Swedes fear his drones are trying to swamp them with internet propaganda. It will be Elin Ersson wot swung it for them – along with the police and authorities at Gothenburg Airport. Ms Ersson filmed herself refusing to sit down on a Turkey-bound plane until a failed asylum-seeker, who was being deported to Afghanistan, was removed. He duly was.    Students have been doing this sort of thing for decades, of course – albeit without the benefit of live-streaming on social media, but

Can France’s World Cup success help in the fight against Islamists?

It’s not surprising that so many Frenchmen and women partied in Paris last Sunday to celebrate their country’s World Cup success. The French side played with style and panache and deserved their victory; there’s also the fact that France hasn’t had much to cheer about in recent years when it comes to sport so they’re entitled to bask in the glory of Les Bleus. As well as cheers last week there were also some jeers – and spits and slaps – all of them aimed at the British cyclist Chris Froome as he peddled up and down mountains in the Tour de France. These are more than just surly reactions to the recent

How May, Macron and Merkel failed to tame Trump

To conclude that relations between the United States and the Europeans are in quite a chaotic and unpredictable state is like saying German Chancellor Angela Merkel misses the good old days of Barack Obama and John Kerry. It’s so obvious that it doesn’t need repeating. There are a whole slew of foreign policy and economic issues that have shaken the U.S.-European relationship out of its traditional complacency. Steel and aluminum tariffs, Europe’s anaemic defense spending, the Iran nuclear deal, Brexit, trade imbalances, and Trump’s style of undiplomatic diplomacy have all thrown the continent for a loop. Trump appears to take pleasure in berating America’s European allies and watching them squirm;

Why Spain could be the populists’ next battleground

When Italy’s interior minister, Matteo Salvini, refused to let the rescue ship Aquarius – which was carrying 629 men, women, and children – land, the European Union was presented with yet another migration emergency. The vessel was stranded for days in the Mediterranean looking for a place to dock, with an EU-wide solution nowhere to be found. Eventually, Spain’s newly-installed socialist government stepped up and allowed the boat to dock. Madrid’s act of statesmanship was a win for everybody: it allowed Salvini to claim that his tough immigrant policy was working; Spain’s prime minister, Pedro Sanchez, could burnish his credentials as a humanitarian; and it solved a problem for the EU,

Why Sebastian Kurz is Europe’s most important politician

Austria assumes the Presidency of the Council of the European Union this Sunday, and normally the response among rightminded Britons would be a resounding ‘Who Cares?’ Even before we voted Leave, this rotating six month stint was generally regarded with indifference. Now we’re on our way out, why should we be bothered whose turn it is in the EU chair? Well, the big difference this time around is that Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz is rapidly emerging as Europe’s most influential politician. And for the EU, his spell in the hot seat could hardly have come at a more crucial time. Like Trump’s America and Brexit Britain, Europe is divided. In

How Spain’s socialist leader is winning over reluctant voters

Spaniards didn’t ask for their new prime minister, but it seems that they’re starting to like him. The most recent polls reveal that Pedro Sánchez’s Socialists, who now make up Spain’s minority government, are the most popular party in the country. Less than a month ago, the PSOE slumbered in third place, behind the then-ruling Conservative Popular Party (PP) and centrist Ciudadanos. The Socialists have leapt two places up the rankings, even though their seizure of power was seen as illegitimate by many Spaniards. What’s gone so right for Spain’s Socialists?   Sánchez’s surge in popularity can perhaps be partly explained by the diversity of his cabinet; made up of eleven

Is there life after Merkel for German conservatives?

German conservatives are in disarray. Caught between the migrant crisis and Merkel’s looming departure, they are fighting over their own political future. On the surface, Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU) and their smaller sister-party, the Bavarian Christian Social Union (CSU), argue over whether German police forces should be allowed to reject certain asylum seekers at the border. But the actual conflict runs deeper: it is not simply about whether or not to reject a few thousands refugees at the border; this is about the very future of German conservative politics. Merkel has now led German conservatives for thirteen years. And although she has brought them continuous electoral success during that

Gavin Mortimer

Macron is restoring France’s dignity

Has there ever been a time when the leaders of France and Great Britain are so diametrically opposed in character and style? One is weak and indecisive, a Prime Minister who avoids confrontation, the other is forthright and forceful, a president who relishes a fight. Emmanuel Macron seems to take a perverse delight in upsetting his compatriots; one can detect in his behaviour a healthy contempt for a section of French society. These are the slackers to whom he referred in a speech last year, the coasters, the self-entitled, the people he believes have grown up believing the state will look after them, whatever. Last week he railed against a social

Nicholas Farrell

Matteo Salvini’s tough immigration stance is paying off

Well, stone me. A new “populist” government in Italy actually does something to stop the NGO taxi service which ferries migrants masquerading as refugees from the Libyan coast to Sicily 350 miles away. It does what no Italian government has dared do before and refuses to allow an NGO ship with hundreds of migrants on board, nearly all men from sub-Saharan Africa, or men pretending to be boys, to dock in Italy. And it says it will block all NGO migrant ships in the future. Europe’s liberal imperialists are duly appalled at what the deplorable populists now in charge of the EU’s fourth largest economy have done. Whether left-wing multiculturalists or right-wing global

How Nato is fighting back against Russian fake news

At first, the Spanish marines are just a distant dot on the horizon. A few minutes later their speedboat is on our starboard side. The marines clamber aboard, disarm the irregulars who’ve seized this Romanian frigate, and secure the helicopter landing pad on the windswept stern. Watching from a safe distance, you’d never know this was just a wargame. As a Romanian sailor told me, as I struggled to control my seasick stomach, the way you fight in a real war depends upon the way you train. Welcome to Sea Shield, a naval warfare exercise involving 21 ships and 12 aircraft from seven Nato allies: Bulgaria, Greece, Romania, Spain, Turkey,

Charles Moore

Italy’s populists have won – but they’re still not in charge

Recently, the ‘populist’ (i.e. electorally victorious) new government of Italy wanted to appoint an anti-euro finance minister and was told by the President of the Republic that it couldn’t. This caused outrage in Italy, and it made rational people here assume that there would have to be new elections, or the impeachment of the president. In fact, however, both sides have won, or at least lived to fight another day. Professor Savona is not to be finance minister, but Europe minister instead, and the populists are still in charge, yet not in charge. This should not be surprising if one remembers Professor Savona’s own dictum that the euro is ‘a

Italy isn’t the next Greece. Here’s why | 6 June 2018

Everyone thinks they know the script of how Italy’s saga will play out. As the populists take power in Rome, they will rail against Brussels, try to fight austerity, come up with some bold plans for reforming the euro, and hold a referendum or two. And then they will meekly cave in as Angela Merkel and the European Central Bank, the euro-zone’s equivalent of Gordon Brown’s ‘big clunking fist’ from a decade ago, bring them to heel. After all, that’s what happened in Greece when Syriza took power. A lot of fighting talk was followed by a dismal surrender, and five years of budget cuts, tax rises, and unending recession.

Gavin Mortimer

Emmanuel Macron’s challenge for French lesbians | 6 June 2018

The man who brought France’s Socialist Party to the brink of ruin has no sense of shame. In recent weeks, François Hollande has been plugging his memoirs all over the media and even hinting at a political comeback, much to the “exasperation” of his party, who wish the former president would go quietly into the night. The book, The lessons of Power, is rumoured to have been written with the help of a well-known left-wing journalist, but the delusions are all Hollande’s. His bitterness towards Emmanuel Macron seeps through the prose, and for every swipe at his successor there is also a claim that France’s gradual economic upturn is down