With Europe reeling from the impact of Russia’s war in UkraineOlaf Scholz has been clear: germany first. After the meeting of the German chancellor with the French president Emmanuel Macron In Berlin two weeks ago, in which the Frenchman called on his main European partner to close ranks against Vladimir Putin, it became clear that Angela Merkel’s heir has his sights set much more on his survival than on leading the Old Continent like its predecessor.
scholtz
Concerned about the right-wing marches that demanded a few weeks ago in Berlin for the increased energy and possible lack of gas in the coming winter, under the slogan that sanctions on Russia be lifted, Scholz decided to establish an emergency fund of 200,000 million euros to subsidize gas prices, provoking a furious response from some European leaders.
The Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, accused Scholz of “selfishness” and “destroying” the single market. The concern openly shared by both Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin and Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas is that German subsidies will give the country’s manufacturers an unfair advantage over industry in other EU countries.
“The richest country, the most powerful country in the EU is trying to use this crisis to gain a competitive advantage for their companies in the single market. This is not fair, this is not how the single market should work,” Morawiecki said at the EU summit in Prague. Informal but urgent meeting, given the divisions that threaten Europe after the victory of georgia melon in Italy, and taking away from Liz Truss, new British Prime Minister, to the conflicts on the continent. “We have to find a common solution, otherwise the countries with the most budgetary flexibility will have an advantage over the others,” Kallas warned in Prague.
What worries European leaders more than the details of Scholz’s gas fund, however, is the growing tendency of the continent’s biggest player to act only on economic issues and security, a profile that they fear will erode European cohesion.
Macron
Last week, Scholz visited Spain, where he pushed for the completion of a new gas pipeline from the Iberian Peninsula to northern Europe, to make up for supplies Germany has lost from Russia. Emmanuel Macron He has vigorously opposed the plan, which would run through French territory, arguing that it makes no economic sense. And the European Commission shares that view, but the German chancellor is going ahead anyway, even exploring whether the project could bypass France altogether.
Today in the EU there are a majority who want German coordination (and money), but do not trust Berlin to lead. Germany’s dogged pursuit of Russian gas and its quixotic pursuit of years of “dialogue” with Moscow in the face of the president’s repeated transgressions Vladimir Putin (not to mention Scholz’s refusal to offer Ukraine stronger military support) have robbed Berlin of its credibility. especially in Central and Eastern Europe.
In opposition appears the figure of the French president, who despite having reached re-election and a parliamentary victory by the slightest difference, and with a complicated internal front, bets on leading the bloc with temperance. This was demonstrated last week when he even challenged the American Joe Bidencalling for the prevailing cold head amid escalating doomsday rhetoric.
“We must speak carefully when commenting on these matters,” he settled at an EU summit. “I have always refused to get involved in political fiction, and especially … when it comes to nuclear weapons,” he added after the words of Biden, who spoke last weekend of the possibility of a “nuclear armageddon“.
Truss
With the former German Chancellor Angela Merkel withdrawal and after Britain kicked the bucket with Brexit, Macron is now the main European leader and the biggest supporter of the EU. And Macron’s newfound prominence is because France sees itself as a great power allied to the United States, but philosophically independent: he is a staunch supporter of the West and of democracy; he is dedicated to keeping the European NATO powers behind Ukraine; but it also has an open channel with Moscow.
Link that he hopes will lead to a diplomatic closure for a conflict that today seems tied after the Russian withdrawal, a scenario that offends the Putin’s triumphalist ego and threatens a disproportionate and nuclear response from the Kremlin.
In a wide-ranging interview with CNN, Macron sought to explain the psychological forces that shaped Putin’s actions and defended his decision to continue speaking with the Russian leader. And he expressed his deep concern about global democracy and about the elections in the United States (a campaign that forces Biden to be tougher), and shrugged his shoulders when asked about the British Prime Minister’s refusal, Liz Trussto say if he and France were “friends or enemies”.
without hesitation, Macron emphasized that the UK was “a friendly nationstrong and allied, regardless of their leaders, and sometimes in spite of and beyond their leaders, or whatever mistakes they may make when they play politics.”
The UK and France have clashed over a number of issues in recent years, including migrant boat crossings in the Channel, and Brexit that involve Northern Ireland, an agenda that has an impact on Truss’s internal front, which, like scholz, today he is presented as the main concern, while Macron finds in his European transcendence, a shield against the internal French politics. he
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