The Snezhkov family at a protest in Gomel on September 27
As reported by the World Union of Old believers, The Old Believers living in the historical region of their historically traditional regional residence in the Republic of Belarus became victims of the violence unfolding in this country before the whole world. On September 27-29, the Old Believers stated, the spouses German and Natalya Snezhkov were detained in the city of Gomel, after which the Belarusian authorities removed their young children – Aglaya and Matvey – to an orphanage.
Their supposed ‘crime’ was “simply to support the protests against falsification of the last presidential elections in Belarus”. The Snezhkovs did nothing illegal and did not violate the law in any way. Acting upon their rights, guaranteed by both international and national Belarusian laws, they peacefully, without weapons and even without slogans, took to the streets of their hometown together with other residents of Gomel demanding fair elections – according to the law. A few hours after this action, policemen came to the Old Believers’ home and carried out a search, after which the head of the family was taken away and then, a couple of days later, his wife was arrested and the children were taken away. The World Union of the Old Believers regards these actions as “an act of intimidation and an attempt to suppress the human freedoms given by God to openly express their moral views on the ongoing processes in society”.
The Old Believer tradition fosters in a person such qualities as utmost honesty, pedantic execution of the law, conscientiousness and responsibility in work, in social and family life. “It is not surprising that the carriers of these high moral qualities cause fear among ill-wishers” said the spokesperson of The World Union of Old Believers.
When speaking on behalf of the many millions of Old Believers throughout the world, their representative demands that “the Belarusian authorities immediately release the captured Snezhkov family. We intend to follow their fate, provide them with all possible legal and material assistance, turning, inter alia, to international institutions that ensure the protection of human rights. May the Lord give peace and prosperity to the long-suffering land of Belarus!” said the representative of the World Union of Old Believers.
At bottom, Christianity is favored in the policies and practices of government officials. Other religions are disfavored, as with Muslim travel bans.
Buzz Thomas | Guest columnist
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U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos discusses religious freedom during Nashville visit
U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos answers questions about religious freedom in education at the National Religious Broadcasters convention at the Gaylord Resort and Convention Center.
Buzz Thomas is a retired minister, attorney and a member of USA Today’s Board of Contributors.
Republicans can’t stop talking about religious freedom. Me neither. Liberty of conscience is one of the founding principles of our republic. Just read the first 16 words of the First Amendment.
But calling a cow a billy goat doesn’t make it one.
I’m afraid that what President Donald Trump and other Republican thought leaders keep referring to as religious liberty may not be the real deal. In fact, it comes dangerously close to something that might undermine the very freedom it purports to protect.
‘A haven for the cause of conscience’
America was founded as a “haven for the cause of conscience,” to borrow a term from Roger Williams, Pastor of the first Baptist church in America and founder and first governor of Rhode Island, Williams said it about his own state, but after passage of the First Amendment, it was true for all of America.
The U.S. Constitution guarantees “free exercise” of religion for persons of all faiths and “no establishment” for any faith – thereby erecting a “wall of separation” between church and state, according to Thomas Jefferson.
America’s churches flourished under this new arrangement. They were reliant on their own resources instead of tax dollars, and they were free to exercise their faith with enthusiasm and criticize their government where appropriate. Mostly, they were free to advocate their faith to the world without fear of reprisal, and hearers were free to answer yes or no. That’s what real religious freedom looks like.
Among modern U.S. presidents, none took to religious freedom more enthusiastically than Bill Clinton. He provided critical support to the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, directed Secretary of Education Richard Riley to issue strong guidelines for protecting religious freedom in public schools and released guidelines to protect religious freedom in the federal workplace. Some of these guidelines have been updated and strengthened by Trump. President Barack Obama was also a friend to religious freedom, and when the Affordable Care Act was passed, he ensured that religious organizations had easy access to opt-out provisions from the ACA’s contraceptive mandate. Again, that’s what religious freedom looks like.
The tricky thing about religious freedom is that it has to be for everyone. Even for religions you may not like or people of no faith whatsoever. Otherwise, you slip back into that Old World European model that our ancestors fought so hard to escape.
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What is Christian nationalism?
Which brings me to Christian nationalism. The merging of two very good things – Christianity and patriotism – into one very bad (and very dangerous) thing. Sort of like gasoline and matches. We want them both. Just not together.
Pence talks faith, pandemic, police at Latter-day Saints for Trump event
Vice President Mike Pence spoke Tuesday about issues like religious freedom, COVID-19 and the police at a Latter-day Saints for Trump event in Mesa.
Christian nationalism happens when church and state are linked. Politicians use God to baptize their policies, and clergy use tax dollars to fund their churches and schools. At bottom, Christianity is favored in the policies and practices of government officials. Other religions are disfavored, as with Muslim travel bans. Or where government-funded programs are allowed to hire only Christians. Or where the Supreme Court is asked to allow tax dollars to be used for private religious education. All of which the Trump administration is doing.
At first blush, this may appeal to you if you’re a Christian. But think back to what government support ultimately does to religion. In Europe, it destroyed it. Roger Williams said that on good days it produces hypocrites. On bad days? Rivers of blood.
What we want in America is what we’ve had. Religious freedom for all. And the recognition that my freedom is best guarded by protecting the freedom of my Jewish neighbor, my Muslim classmate or my Buddhist employee. America has the strongest religious and political institutions on the planet due in no small measure to the genius of our Constitution, which has kept the government neutral in matters of faith.
Christian nationalism threatens all of that. It would render unto Caesar not just Caesar’s things but God’s things. That can’t be good for either church or state. (To learn more about Christian nationalism, visit christiansagainstchristiannationalism.org).
Buzz Thomas is a retired minister, attorney and a member of USA Today’s Board of Contributors.
The purpose of the meeting was to provide an update to those present on the ongoing negotiations for a future relationship between Gibraltar and the EU
Gibraltar Chief Minister Fabian Picardo and the Deputy Chief Minister Dr. Joseph Garcia held a virtual meeting with members of the All-Party Group on Gibraltar on Thursday, which included Members of the House of Commons and the House of Lords with Group Chair Sir Bob Neil MP.
The meeting included a broad cross spectrum of Members from the Conservative Party,
Labour Party, Liberal Democrats, Scottish National Party and the Democratic Unionist Party
The purpose of the meeting was to provide an update to those present on the ongoing
negotiations for a future relationship between Gibraltar and the European Union.
The Chief Minister explained the objectives of the Gibraltar Government which were for an agreement on the future which does not cross Gibraltar’s red lines on sovereignty, jurisdiction and control. The Deputy Chief Minister provided an update on the plans for leaving the transition at the end of the year without an agreement.
There was a keen interest on the part of MPs and Peers in the situation here, which was reflected in many questions, and they expressed their continued support for Gibraltar going forward.
Member of the European Parliament Anna Cinzia Bonfrisco posted the following on her Facebook page:
“Today I made a parliamentary statement drawing attention to the evolving trade relations between EU and Azerbaijan, regardless of ongoing hostilities against Armenia, for which the Azerbaijani government bears responsibility, as well as to the latter’s very dangerous relations with Erdogan.
Hence, I addressed a question to the Commission, to clarify whether it was realized without the European values being taken into consideration, without the necessary mechanisms for monitoring the European subsidies, and moreover, how exactly is the EU going to answer to the President of Armenia calling for the assistance of the international community.
The Azerbaijani aggression against Armenia is a result of the EU institutions policy of giving consideration to the geopolitical perspective only when the business is concerned and keeping silence when there is a need to protect the weakest from injustice and violence.”
Islamic ‘separatism’ – PARIS — President Emmanuel Macron, trying to rid France of what authorities call a “parallel society” of radical Muslims thriving outside the values of the nation, laid out a series of measures on Friday in a proposed law that would disrupt the education, finances and other means of indoctrination of the vulnerable.
Macron has coined the term “separatism” to describe the underworld that thrives in some neighbourhoods around France where Muslims with a radical vision of their religion take control of the local population to instil their beliefs.
Macron stressed in a speech that stigmatizing French Muslims would be falling into a “trap” laid by radicals. He blamed France itself for organizing the “ghettoization” of a population that could easily fall prey to the preaching of those whose goal is to substitute their laws for those of the nation and reiterated that secularism is the “cement” of France.
He spoke in Les Mureaux, a working-class town west of Paris, after meeting with the mayor, Francois Garay, who is largely credited with building projects that help bring the Muslim population into the mainstream. He said that 70 people from the region of Les Yvelines, where the town is located, travelled to Syria and Iraq.
Macron gave his speech while a trial is underway in Paris over the deadly January 2015 attacks on satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo and a kosher supermarket by French-born Islamic extremists. Last week, a man from Pakistan stabbed two people near Charlie Hebdo’s former offices in anger over its publication of caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad. Macron noted both cases.
The president laid out a five-point plan aimed at upending the world that lets those who promote a radical brand of Islam thrive, notably via associations or home schools that steep members and students in radical ideology.
France has the largest Muslim population in Western Europe with up to 5 million members, and Islam is the country’s No. 2 religion.
The proposed bill, which would go to parliament early next year, would require all children from the age of 3 to attend French schools, and allow distance learning only for medical reasons. Associations, which receive state funding, would be made accountable for their spending, their sometimes invisible leaders and be forced to reimburse misused funds.
Macron called France’s schools “the heart of secularism [where] children become citizens.”
Authorities contend that the vector for inculcating Muslims with an extremist ideology was once the mosque but, today, the main vector is schools.
The proposed measures nevertheless address mosques, which Macron said are sometimes subject to hostile takeovers, as well as imams to keep houses of prayer and preachers out of the control of people who use religion for their own ends.
“In a few days, you can see radical Islamists…take control of associations [running mosques] and all their finances. That won’t happen again,” the French president said.
“We’re going to install an anti-putsch system, very robust, in the law,” Macron said without elaborating.
The bill, which is to be sent to religious leaders for review this month, also includes putting a gradual end to the long-standing practice of importing imams from elsewhere, notably Turkey, Algeria and Morocco, and instead training imams in France to assure there are enough. A Muslim organization that serves as an official conduit to French leaders is to take part in the project.
The rector of the Grand Mosque of Paris cautioned against mixing all Muslims in France with the “separatism question.”
“For those who let it be believed that Islam is Islamism, and the reverse, there is indeed a distinction between the Muslim religion and the Islamist ideology,” Chems-Eddine Hafiz wrote in a commentary in the newspaper Le Monde.
However, the rector threw his support behind the initiative — on condition it’s not used as a communications gadget.
For Macron, a perverse version of the religion has penetrated French society, including public services, from Paris’ Charles de Gaulle airport to the transport system. He said some bus drivers have been known to bar women with short skirts from getting aboard.
French President Emmanuel Macron, right, wearing a protective face mask speaks to youngsters standing in line outside the ‘la Maison des habitants’ (MDH) in Les Mureaux, northwest of Paris, Friday, Oct. 2, 2020. President Emmanuel Macron, trying to rid France of what authorities say is a “parallel society” of radical Muslims thriving outside the values of the nation, is laying the groundwork Friday for a proposed law aimed at helping remedy the phenomenon. (Ludovic Marin / Pool via AP)
French President Emmanuel Macron delivers a speech to present his strategy to fight separatism, Friday Oct. 2, 2020 in Les Mureaux, outside Paris. President Emmanuel Macron, trying to rid France of what authorities say is a “parallel society” of radical Muslims thriving outside the values of the nation, is laying the groundwork Friday for a proposed law aimed at helping remedy the phenomenon. (Ludovic Marin / POOL via AP)
French President Emmanuel Macron, right, wearing a protective face mask speaks to youngsters standing in line outside the ‘la Maison des habitants’ (MDH) in Les Mureaux, northwest of Paris, Friday, Oct. 2, 2020. President Emmanuel Macron, trying to rid France of what authorities say is a “parallel society” of radical Muslims thriving outside the values of the nation, is laying the groundwork Friday for a proposed law aimed at helping remedy the phenomenon. (Ludovic Marin / Pool via AP)
French President Emmanuel Macron wears his mask after deliveing a speech to present his strategy to fight separatism, Friday Oct. 2, 2020 in Les Mureaux, outside Paris. President Emmanuel Macron, trying to rid France of what authorities say is a “parallel society” of radical Muslims thriving outside the values of the nation, is laying the groundwork Friday for a proposed law aimed at helping remedy the phenomenon. (Ludovic Marin / POOL via AP)
French President Emmanuel Macron delivers a speech to present his strategy to fight separatism, Friday Oct. 2, 2020 in Les Mureaux, outside Paris. President Emmanuel Macron, trying to rid France of what authorities say is a “parallel society” of radical Muslims thriving outside the values of the nation, is laying the groundwork Friday for a proposed law aimed at helping remedy the phenomenon. (Ludovic Marin / POOL via AP)
French President Emmanuel Macron delivers a speech to present his strategy to fight separatism, Friday Oct. 2, 2020 in Les Mureaux, outside Paris. President Emmanuel Macron, trying to rid France of what authorities say is a “parallel society” of radical Muslims thriving outside the values of the nation, is laying the groundwork Friday for a proposed law aimed at helping remedy the phenomenon. (Ludovic Marin / POOL via AP)
French President Emmanuel Macron wears a protective face mask as he arrives at the ‘la Maison des habitants’ (MDH) in Les Mureaux, northwest of Paris, Friday, Oct. 2, 2020. President Emmanuel Macron, trying to rid France of what authorities say is a “parallel society” of radical Muslims thriving outside the values of the nation, is laying the groundwork Friday for a proposed law aimed at helping remedy the phenomenon. (Ludovic Marin / Pool via AP)
Young representatives of the municipal council attend ceremony with French President Emmanuel Macron in Les Mureaux, northwest of Paris, Friday, Oct. 2, 2020. President Emmanuel Macron, trying to rid France of what authorities say is a “parallel society” of radical Muslims thriving outside the values of the nation, is laying the groundwork Friday for a proposed law aimed at helping remedy the phenomenon. (Ludovic Marin / POOL via AP)
French President Emmanuel Macron delivers a speech to present his strategy to fight separatism, Friday Oct. 2, 2020 in Les Mureaux, outside Paris. President Emmanuel Macron, trying to rid France of what authorities say is a “parallel society” of radical Muslims thriving outside the values of the nation, is laying the groundwork Friday for a proposed law aimed at helping remedy the phenomenon. (Ludovic Marin / POOL via AP)
COMECE calls for concrete solidarity and generosity
Following the adoption of the new EU Pact on Migration and Asylum proposed by the European Commission on Wednesday 23 September 2020, the Bishops of the European Union encourage the EU and its Member States to act in concrete solidarity and responsibility towards migrants and refugees.
Considering the dysfunctionalities of the current migration and asylum systems and the dramatic situations that have recently affected many migrants and their families in Europe, COMECE welcomes the initiative of the European Commission to set out a new and comprehensive framework with the aim of creating a fair and predictable migration management mechanism rebuilding trust between the Member States.
In view of the future negotiations, COMECE encourages the European Parliament and the Council to prioritize the protection of the human dignity and the promotion of the common good. The Bishops urge the EU and its Member States to recognize migrants and refugees as persons with dignity and fundamental rights, and not as numbers.
Using the words of Pope Francis, migrants have “a name, a face, and a story, as well as an inalienable right to live in peace and to aspire to a better future for their sons and daughters”.
The proposed EU package includes a number of positive developments such as the special treatment at the border for unaccompanied minors, quicker reply to asylum applicants and clarification of their rights and duties, access of migrants to the benefits of the European Pillar of Social Rights, paving the way for long term residence.
The EU and its Member States must protect asylum seekers and their families, fulfilling the obligation of non-refoulment to the country where they were at risk and supporting their resilience and full inclusion in the hosting society.
The clear reinforcement of the return policy included in the EU package should be balanced – according to COMECE – with a more generous approach towards social and economic migrants, opening broader legal pathways for their regular access to the European Union in a spirit of fraternal hospitality.
Regarding the relocation of asylum seekers across the EU, it is unclear how the mechanism will be implemented, as the proposed system is highly dependent on the decision of each Member State. Concerning this issue, COMECE calls on the EU and its Member States to improve and increase the support to those countries that geographically are more exposed to high influx of migrants and refugees.
As stated by Pope Francis, we have to prevent the Mediterranean Sea to turn into a vast cemetery, therefore COMECE reiterates that rescuing people in distress at sea is a moral and legal obligation that should respected by all State and non-State actors.
To be sure, countries are also seeing some two million new COVID-19 cases each week, WHO Executive Director Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters at his latest press briefing in Geneva.
Describing four varying national situations, he said those countries that jumped on the virus quickly have avoided large outbreaks. Others had large outbreaks but were able to bring them under control and continue to suppress the virus.
Some economies that had controlled an initial outbreak, and subsequently eased restrictions, have seen an increase in cases, he said. And there are still other countries that are in the intense phase of transmission.
Turning the tide
“It is never too late to turn the tide”, he assured, stressing that in every region, countries have developed a collective blueprint for suppressing the virus – and saved both lives and livelihoods.
For its part, WHO will continue to support national action plans through its regional and national country offices.
“This is a critical moment in the outbreak response”, he said, urging leaders to strengthen their response by putting in place targeted measures to suppress the spread and ensuring that health systems and workers are protected.
Solidary equals speed
“For us all, the fastest way for us to get through this is to act together”, he stressed. He issued a call to “keep doing the basics” of physical distancing, hand washing, mask wearing, and coughing and sneezing safely away from others. It is also important to avoid crowds and keep windows and doors open when it is not possible to meet friends or family outside.
Tedros welcomed the $1 billion in new funding announced for the Access to COVID-19 Tools (ACT) Accelerator, a collaboration to speed the development, production and equitable access to COVID-19 tests, treatments and vaccines.
Recalling that WHO approved its first antigen-based rapid diagnostic test for Emergency Use Listing, he said “these tests are simple”, providing reliable results in 15-30 minutes – rather than hours or days – at lower prices.
Expressions of interest
He also announced that WHO published today a call for expressions of interest by manufacturers of COVID-19 vaccines – to apply for approval for prequalification and/or Emergency Use Listing.
“Sharing finite resources – from tests to therapeutics to vaccines – is not charity”, he clarified. “It is the smart play for all countries, as it will ensure that they can protect those at most risk.”
US President and COVID-19
Tedros began the press conference, wishing both President Trump and the First Lady of the United States, “a full and swift recovery. Our prayers are with them”, he said.
Responding to a journalist’s question about whether the President’s “disregard” for mask-wearing made it inevitable that he would contract COVID-19, WHO Emergencies Executive Director, Dr. Mike Ryan, said that the agency does not comment on the risk management measures or behaviour of any individual.
“We don’t know what risk management measures were in place”, he said, especially for someone as prominent as a president. “What we will reiterate, is that each and every individual and each and every citizen should be guided by the national guidance in their country.”
We all know “the combination of different measures that reduce risk”, said Dr. Ryan, “and we know these reduce risk; washing your hands, staying a safe distance from other individuals, avoiding crowded spaces, wearing a mask…and doing all of that to protect yourself and others, is the best way to protect society. Our advice doesn’t change.”
“We are a community, and we will get through this together”, he added.
WHO probe of DR Congo abuse allegations
Tedros also addressed disturbing news from the Ebola response in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) of alleged sexual exploitation and abuse by people identifying themselves as working for WHO.
“To be very clear, we are outraged,” he said. “The betrayal of people in the communities we serve is reprehensible.”
WHO will not tolerate such behaviour from its staff, contractors or partners, he said, emphatic that anyone identified as being involved will be held to account and face serious consequences, including immediate dismissal.
Tedros said he has initiated an investigation into the charges, as well as broader protection issues in health emergency response settings.
OHCHRhighlighted what it called a “cycle of violence” whereby people faced deprivation and abuse in Libya, only to be left to drift “for days at sea”. Often, their boats were intercepted dangerously by the authorities and returned to Libya, the UN rights office said, noting that migrants then faced arbitrary detention, torture and other serious human rights violations.
And the situation has become even more acute amid the COVID-19 pandemic, OHCHR continued in its statement, as humanitarian search and rescue vessels have been prevented from heading out to sea, while there is also a lack of access by civil society groups that help migrants.
“What is happening to migrants…is the result of a failed system of migration governance…marked by a lack of solidarity forcing frontline States…to bear the brunt of the responsibility”, said UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet.
Despite the lack of sufficient safe and regular migration channels, migrants continue to take the precarious sea journey, often multiple times – encountering danger and suffering.
Arbitrary detention, torture, trafficking, sexual abuse, forced labour and other serious human rights violations were some of the horrors that migrants in Libya described.
And many reported being intercepted by the Libyan Coast Guard, including having their boats rammed or shot at, causing vessels to capsize or people to desperately jump into the water.
While some reports reflected that commercial vessels did not come to their assistance, others affirmed that commercial ships picked them up only to return the individuals to detention centres in Libya.
OHCHR pointed out that if true, “these are serious allegations of failure to assist people in distress at sea and possible coordinated push-backs that should be duly investigated”.
Mission to Malta
The call followed a week-long UN rights mission to Malta that engaged Government officials, UN partners, migrant community leaders, civil society organizations, speaking to 76 migrants from 25 different countries.
Some migrants there explained that they had been detained for several months, with only one change of clothing and little access to daylight, clean water and sanitation.
They also reported severe overcrowding, poor living conditions and limited contact with the outside world, including lawyers and civil society organizations.
“You’re in jail in Libya and now you come to Europe and prison again”, one migrant testified.
“The pressures on the reception system in Malta have long been known but the pandemic has clearly made an already difficult situation worse”, said Ms. Bachelet.
Despite COVID-19 challenges, “human rights must always be upheld and those who are confined, out of sight as it were, must not be forgotten”, she continued, appealing for European Union States to adopt “a principled approach to migration” and tackle “the shocking conditions” faced by migrants in Libya, at sea, and often when they finally reach Europe, and supposed safety.
At the European Council, leaders gave their strategic guidance on many key foreign policy issues, from our relations with China, the conflict in Nagorno-Karabach and the poisoning of Aleksei Navalny. On the Eastern Mediterranean, we will pursue dialogue with Turkey on outstanding issues. And European leaders tasked me to organise a multilateral conference which could address issues on which multilateral solutions are needed, including maritime delimitation, security, energy, migration and economic cooperation. We clearly prefer the path of constructive relations but the political line is clear: in case of renewed actions by Turkey that breach international law, the EU will use options at its disposal.
One big decision that leaders took was to finally impose sanctions on Belarus. There is no point denying that this decision took a long time: almost two months have passed since the rigged Presidential elections. Many observers and commentators have pointed out that divisions among member states were hampering our collective ability to take a stand, even on issues that are core to the EU’s founding principle. In short, our credibility was at stake.
As long as the EU has been working on developing a common foreign policy, it has had to deal with this kind of splits. From the break up of Yugoslavia, to the Middle East Peace process, the war against Iraq in 2003, the independence of Kosovo or Chinese actions in the South China Sea.
This is of course not the first time that we experience divisions. As long as the EU has been working on developing a common foreign policy, it has had to deal with this kind of splits. From the break up of Yugoslavia, to the Middle East Peace process, the war against Iraq in 2003, the independence of Kosovo or Chinese actions in the South China Sea: there have been many examples where divisions among member states have slowed down or paralysed EU decision-making, or emptied it of substance.
The underlying reasons are not hard to state: history, geography, identity. Member-states look at the world through different prisms and it’s not easy to blend these 27 different ways of defining their national interests into a united, common European interest. Having been Minister of Foreign Affairs of Spain I have sat at both sides of the table. And I know all too well that in the Council we discuss a common EU line, but as soon as we get home, minister focus above all on conducting their national foreign policy, with their own priorities and red lines.
The real question is what to do about this. For me it is clear that the main long-term answer lies in the creation of a common strategic culture: the more Europeans agree on how they see the world and its problems, the more they will agree on what to do about them. That is in part what we intend to do with the work on a Strategic Compass. But all this is a long-term process. And in the meantime, we have to be able to take collective decisions, on tough issues, in real time.
And this brings us to the question of how we take decisions on foreign policy. For decades we have agreed that foreign and security policy must be decided by unanimity, with every country holding a veto. In foreign policy we work a lot with so-called discrete instead of continuous variables. This means many of our decisions are binary in nature: you either recognise a government or not, you launch a crisis management operation or not. And this leads to a lot of blockages and paralysis. In the same way, there are other important policy fields such as taxation or the multi-annual EU budget where the unanimity requirement has also created serious difficulties to find adequate solutions.
The contrast here is with those areas of the EU, from the single market to climate to migration, where the EU can take decisions by qualified majority (55% of member states and 65% of population). And crucially, market rules or climate targets are not secondary issues of lesser sensitivity. Indeed, big national interests at stake, which often clash just as much as in foreign policy.
What matters in the EU is not how a discussion begins; what matters is how it ends.
Moreover, it is striking that even in the areas where the EU can take decisions by QMV, it mostly doesn’t. Why? Because the ethos of the club is to work for compromises, something everyone can buy into. But for this, all member states need to move and invest in unity. Simply sitting on one’s position creates blockages. And in this specific sense, having the QMV option is important: not to use it but to create an incentive for member states to move and search for common ground. This is how, outside foreign policy, the EU can take decisions on important topics with big interests at stake, even if member states are divided. What matters in the EU is not how a discussion begins; what matters is how it ends.
Right at the start of my mandate I argued that if, in foreign policy, we want to escape the paralysis and delays of the unanimity rule, we ought to think about taking some decisions without requiring the full unanimity of 27. And in February when we were blocked on the launch of Operation Irini to police the arms embargo on Libya, I raised the question at the Munich Security Council how reasonable it is for one country, which would anyway not participate in the naval operation because it lacks a navy, to prevent the other 26 from moving forward.
Let’s be clear: we will not have majority voting across the board. But one could limit it to aspects where we have been frequently blocked in the past – sometimes for completely unrelated reasons – such as human rights statements or sanctions. In her State of the Union , President Von Der Leyen repeated this proposal (it was actually the line in her speech that attracted the largest amount of applause).
Since then, there has been renewed debate on the merits and risks associated to this idea. For instance, the President of the European Council has warned that dropping the unanimity requirement would risk losing the legitimacy and buy-in that is needed when it comes to implementing any decisions. This is without any doubt, an important issue. Others have pointed to the fact that the national veto is an ‘insurance policy or emergency brake’ to protect especially the ability of small countries to defend their core national interests (larger member states may not even need the veto to protect their core national interests).
Abandoning the unanimity rule would not be a silver bullet. But we need to create the right incentives for member states to come together. Just appealing to the need for unity is not enough.
I welcome this debate. I am clear that abandoning the unanimity rule would not be a silver bullet. But we need a discussion on how to create the right incentives for member states to come together. Just appealing to the need for unity is not enough. Which decisions we make and how credible they are, depends crucially on how we make them.
Going forward, some possibilities seem pertinent to me, to be evaluated and discussed:
Maybe it could be better, sometimes, to accept to issue a quick statement at 25 with good substance than wait for several days and come with a lowest common denominator statement at 27?
Maybe it is also better to think not mainly in terms of introducing QMV but also of ‘constructive abstention’? This was a possibility introduced to enable a country to abstain without blocking the Union from moving forward. For example, this was how the EULEX mission in Kosovo was launched in 2006.
And finally, as we are certainly not going to abandon unanimity across the board, could we define areas and tools and instruments where it could make more sense to experiment (for example sanctions, statements, demarches) and, if so, with what kind of safeguards?
I hope that in the weeks and months ahead, for example in the framework of the Conference on the Future of Europe, we can debate the pros and cons of these options, knowing that there is a great and urgent need for the EU to protect its capacity to act in a dangerous world.
Mr Valdis Dombrovskis announced “a launch of a WTO trade and climate initiative, focusing on green goods”, acknowledging that “today, trade is about much more than just trade”. He intends to reshape the EU’s future trade policy to make it more sustainable, including in the Mercosur trade agreement where the EU must “find lasting solutions for the Amazon region” before its ratification.
“Europe needs to become more assertive”, he said, adding that EU’s trade partners using unfair practises will be met with new tools, including a new anti-coercion mechanism- if needed, even against the United States. With China, Mr Dombrovskis seeks to conclude the investment agreement now under negotiation while ensuring that the trade relationship is “restructured to be reciprocal, balanced and fair”.
Enforce sustainable trade deals in practice
MEPs welcomed the planned new trade defence measure but also emphasised that the EU’s tools must be sharp enough to ensure that “existing trade agreements don’t only work on paper but in practice, too.” On Transatlantic trade relations, some MEPs asked for the EU to prepare for the WTO judgment to impose USD4 billion worth of tariffs on US goods in the Boeing case.
Several MEPs called for a trade policy linked closely to the Green Deal and the Sustainable Development Goals, and a long-awaited proposal on enforcing sustainable development chapters in trade agreements through sanctions. Several MEPs expect a new trade commissioner to ensure the Mercosur deal is environmentally sustainable and to protect the respect for human rights in the investment deal with China.
MEPs asked the candidate about obligatory due diligence for companies to ensure sustainable supply chains, which Mr Dombrovskis pledged to propose. Other MEPs wanted to know about future steel safeguards against dumping on the EU market and prospects for an EU-UK trade deal.
Based on the committees’ recommendations, the Conference of Committee Chairs will assess the outcome of the hearing and forward its conclusions to the Conference of Presidents. The latter will carry out the final evaluation on 6 October and decide if the hearing can be concluded. If so, the plenary will vote on whether or not to approve the portfolio change on 7 October, in Brussels.
