Bulgaria takes up EU presidency for 2018

Bulgaria, the EU's poorest member state and seen as its most corrupt, takes up the rotating presidency of the EU Council from January 1
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Among its priorities are the "EU candidate countries":http://ec.europa.eu/environment/enlarg/candidates.htm in the Western Balkans.

"The pre-accession period is very important for these countries," Daniel Smilov from the Center for Liberal Strategies told Euronews.

"In fact, Bulgaria experienced its fastest development and most important reforms during this period. So if we give the Western Balkans a clear perspective, we can expect a good development. On the other hand, the government will be able to divert attention from topics that are not very pleasing to it, such as the fight against corruption."

Bulgaria and the fYRoM signed a "friendship treaty":https://www.reuters.com/article/us-macedonia-bulgaria-treaty/macedonia-bulgaria-sign-treaty-to-improve-ties-idUSKBN1AH4E3 in 2017, but difference still exist between the neighbours.

"The problem that arises every time between Bulgaria and Macedonia (fYRoM) always has the same origin: the non-recognition of the Macedonian minority in Bulgaria and the questioning of the Macedonian nation," explained Stoiko Stoikov, OMO-Ilinden-Pirin.

"It has always caused conflict. Unfortunately, since the signing of this agreement, and with Sofia's policy, there has been no real development on this issue."

An "EU-Western Balkans summit":http://www.balkaneu.com/bulgaria-to-host-western-balkans-summit-in-sofia-in-may-2018-during-eu-presidency/ is scheduled for May 2018.

Read more: Bulgaria takes up EU presidency | Euronews

EU: It is high time we stand up for our Europe - "united we stand but divided we will fall"

Our Europe is in danger.

Nationalism, xenophobia and insularity threaten its fundamental values.

Our Europe, the most impressive political construction of modern times, cannot stand by as national governments jeopardise its democratic, economic, social, cultural and environmental model.

They have shown inertia and distrust when faced first with economic crisis, then with refugees and most recently with terrorism. Each successive threat has been worsened by a lack of cooperation and coordination between European governments.

The time has surely come for Europe’s citizens to make our voices heard, to express our desire for ever stronger unity and solidarity, for deeper political union.

Europe is not the cause of our problems, but the solution. For too long, our fate has sat in the hands of national and foreign leaders and partially discredited European institutions.

Once a symbol of peace, openness and solidarity, Europe has become synonymous with insularity, exclusion and self-absorption. And where Europeans are increasingly struggling to see their values reflected.

Let us not consign ourselves to helplessness, to a lack of confidence, to doubts and fears, to images of refugees dying at our borders because of a lack of solidarity from member states and because our leaders do not have the courage to do the right thing.

It is now urgent for us to move beyond the strictly national arena and to construct a truly European political foundation to take on the challenges of globalisation, modernity and a revived democracy through the direct elections of EU leaders and a progressive independent foreign policy which is not tied to any destructive foreign nation's policy.

Our sense of belonging to a European people, to a community of values, is too often thwarted by our inability to translate this desire into politics.  We need to continuously send messages to our political leaders, stating that Europe is our nation and that it can have no future without political union and the construction of a firm shell around a united European state with its own foreign policy.

“If we cannot dream of a better Europe, we will never construct a better Europe” Václav Havel, former President of the Czech Republic once said.. Let us show our desire for Europe to step forward.

Let us fly Europe’s flag – our flag – on our social network profiles, our web pages, our houses, our cars and bikes, everywhere!

This call is supported, among others, by VOXEurope, Fabien Cazenave, Pietro De Matteis (Federalist Party), Bernard Guetta (France Inter), Eric Jozsef (Libération), Ovidiu Nahoi (Dilema Veche, RFI Romania), Wojciech Przybylski (Eurozine), José Ignacio Torreblanca (El País), Anne Tréca, Nicolas Vadot (Le Vif), Francesco Belluscio, Mario Benvenuto, Esther Cordero, Luca Feltrin, Sabrina Paglierani, Davide Pozzo, EU-Digest

EU-Digest

European Union: Post-Brexit: EU Still a Superpower - by Steven Hill

If you type the words “European Union” and “crisis” into the Google search engine, you instantly receive 115 million hits. When I did that back in 2009, before the eurozone crisis, “only” 58 million hits popped up. Is the EU really in that much worse shape today?

Apparently yes, according to the daily headlines. Recall that even before the Brexit vote, French Prime Minister Manuel Valls declared that Europe could “fall apart within months.”

But this is not the first time that political leaders and media outlets have declared the end of Europe.
Prior to the economic crisis of 2008, the European economy was written off by most analysts as suffering from “Eurosclerosis” and condemned to decline.

Here’s a small sample of brassy headlines from leading media outlets over the last decade, trumpeting imminent collapse:

“The End of Europe”, “Europe Isn’t Working”, “Will Europe Ever Work?”, “What’s Wrong with Europe”, “Is Europe Dying?”, “The Decline and Fall of Europe”, “Why America Outpaces Europe”, and many more.

In the 1990s, The Economist dubbed Germany the new “sick man of Europe,” and other media doomsayers warned of a future of rising unemployment, crime, and taxes to “a level not seen since the Weimar Republic.” Yet now a prospering Germany has become a global player.

Yes, the EU is juggling a number of daunting situations, but that’s what superpowers do. They deal with one crisis after another, year after year, some of them domestic and others international.

A superpower by definition occupies a big corner of the world, in which messes happen and things have a tendency to fall apart.

That rationale, always applied to the United States of America, also has its place when analyzing the EU.
But does the EU really qualify for that lofty status? Emphatically yes. First, the EU is powered by one of the world’s great economic engines.

Even with the eurozone crisis, what I call the EU-Plus (EU28 + Norway and Switzerland) still has the largest economy in the world (post-Brexit, the UK would still be part of the EU-Plus, due to the deep integration of the UK and EU economies). These nations produce a quarter of the world’s GDP.

Indeed, according to World Bank figures, the EU-Plus economy is larger than that of the United States and India combined.

Read more: Post-Brexit: EU Still a Superpower - The Globalist

Back To The European Community - by Rene Cuperus

The European Union needs a strong dose of John Gray philosophy. The European Project as it has developed over the years needs a strong antidote against hybris. An antidote against imperial overstretch. An antidote against technocratic materialism and the Brussels ‘one size fits all’ tyranny. And a Gray-ish antidote against naïve and dangerous utopian thinking. John Gray’s thoughts (and work) stand for a realistic common sense filter. For modesty. Self- constraint. And self-criticism.  

That’s what the European Project utterly needs, if it ever wants to be able to reconnect to the hearts and minds of the majority of the European people.

No misunderstanding. History forced us to become Europeans, to be Europeans. The historical legacy of Europe in the 20^th century should lead to intensive forms of cooperation, cross-border coordination between European nation states, to overcome national superiority thinking, ethnic definitions of national identity or cultural hostility.

History transformed us, Dutchmen, French, English, Swedes & Poles into Europeans. The bloody European civil war 1914-1945, the Communist and Nazi occupation, have made Europe into a ‘’language community’’. The common language being about war and oppression, persecution and lack of freedom. Being European means that one feels obliged to do everything possible never to let European peoples get into violent conflict, or under occupation, again.

That’s fair enough. Europeans we should be and have to be. But only to a certain extent. To certain limits. Defined by the radius of action of democracy, solidarity, shared values and cultural understanding.

Is Eutopia, the European Dream of Unity, the right and only answer to that? That remains the big question. Especially in these days of the eurocrisis.

Without such a fundamental debate about the future of the European project, the pan-European revolt of populism will gain more and more momentum.

Read more: Back To The European Community!

Op-Ed Europe: EU budget sets the wrong priorities

The EU heads of state and government have finally agreed on a seven-year budget for the 27-member bloc but Deutsche Welle Christoph Hasselbach  in his Op-Ed says that by seeking to please everyone, the budget has set the wrong priorities.

It was a difficult birth. After two summits and several grueling late night meetings, the EU's leaders emerged with a seven-year budget and blackened rings under their eyes. But despite all the work, the product is disappointing. In order to stave off numerous veto threats, three major groups of countries and interests had to be satisfied.

First, the rich countries of the north insisted on cuts to the entire budget. British Prime Minister David Cameron, just as during the summit last November, refused to give in - he's under too much domestic pressure. And now, for the first time, the EU budget will be smaller than it was the previous year.

Secondly, the countries with important agricultural sectors - above all France - wanted to keep their farm subsidies. And thirdly, there were the states of Southern and Eastern Europe, who were fighting to keep EU development money for poorer regions.

Some countries were represented in more than one of these groups, like Germany. While Chancellor Angela Merkel was demanding budget austerity, the minister of agriculture was pushing for German farmers to keep their subsidies with as few changes as possible.

And then, more and more countries began demanding a discount on their membership fees. Britain certainly fought to keep its "eternal" discount.

Read more: Opinion: EU budget sets the wrong priorities | Europe | DW.DE | 08.02.2013

A Day For Europe to Count Its Blessings - by Harvey Morris

Europe is in danger of giving itself a nervous breakdown with all the talk of economic failure and irreversible decline. So it’s worth remembering that, although things might sometimes have been better, they have frequently been worse.

And what better reminder than Tuesday’s ceremonies marking Victory in Europe Day, 67th anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe and the unconditional surrender of the Nazi Third Reich.

May 8, 1945 marked the start of a period of recovery in which, with massive assistance from the United States, Europe rebuilt itself from the literal ashes of total war.

It also marked the beginnings of a pan-European enterprise that, for all the current failings of the European Union that eventually emerged from it, was inspired by the ideal that the continent’s nations should never go to war again.

French president-elect François Hollande and the defeated Nicolas Sarkozy were together at the Arc de Triomphe in Paris for Tuesday’s memorial ceremonies, a symbol that, although Europe might be broke, it remains democratic and civilized.

For more: A Day For Europe to Count Its Blessings - NYTimes.com

EU - European Commission proposes to make 2013 the "European Year of Citizens"

European Union citizenship and the rights that go with it are one of the key pillars of the European Union. As we mark the 20th anniversary of the establishment of Union citizenship under the Maastricht Treaty, on 1 November 1993, the European Commission has proposed to designate 2013 as the "European Year of Citizens".

20 years after the creation of Union citizenship, tangible progress has been made that directly affects the lives of millions. To take just one example: nowadays traveling abroad entails cheaper travel costs, hassle-free border crossings, package holiday guarantees, access to healthcare systems and cheaper calls when you phone home. These are just some of the benefits derived from EU citizenship. The Commission's goal is to make sure that the remaining hurdles people face when exercising their rights abroad are removed.

To mark the European Year of Citizens 2013, a range of events, conferences and seminars will be organised across the EU at Union, national, regional or local level. The Commission is also planning to strengthen the visibility of the multilingual Europe Direct and Your Europe web portals as key elements of a 'one-stop-shop' information system on Union citizens' rights, as well as the role and visibility of problem solving tools, such as SOLVIT, to allow Union citizens to better make use of and defend their rights.

“Free movement is the most cherished right in the European Union. It is synonymous with Union citizenship. Businesses and citizens are reaping huge rewards as the EU steadily breaks down internal barriers to the free movement of goods, services and people. I want to build on our achievements so that all EU citizens feel comfortable when travelling, shopping, studying or settling in another EU Member State", said Vice-President Viviane Reding, EU-Commissioner responsible for Justice and Citizenship. ”If Europeans do not know their rights, they cannot effectively exercise them. Today 48% of Europeans feel that they are not well informed about their rights. The European Year of Citizens will help us change this. It will be a good opportunity to remind people what the European Union can do for every one of us."

EU-Digest

Trichet Urges New Vision of Europe

European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet urged policy makers to revitalize the vision of an integrated Europe.

“These days, ‘Europe’ and the benefits it brings have come to be taken for granted,” Trichet said in a speech in Brussels last night, according to a text provided by the ECB. “Thanks to the success of European integration, the threat of war has become a memory of the past for many Europeans, in particular the younger generation. This makes it all the more urgent to develop a renewed vision of the kind of Europe we want and indeed need -- a vision that is easily understood and shared among European Union citizens.”

For more: Trichet Urges New Vision of Europe - Bloomberg