European Union

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EU Ministers of Foreign and European Affairs meet in Brussels on 15 November 2017 to be updated on ongoing work to amend the Common Provisions Regulation. They are also discussing the future of Cohesion Policy post 2020.

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It’s becoming increasingly obvious that fake news in some of Britain’s leading newspapers helped to cause Brexit.

Every day newspapers such as the Daily Mail and Daily Express print articles that promote hatred of migrants and the EU generally.

‘Too many EU migrants’ was cited as one of the main reasons people voted for Leave in last year’s referendum.

Yesterday Prime Minister, Theresa May, gave a speech at the Lord Mayor’s banquet in London, accusing Russia of using fake news to ‘sow discord in the West’. That may be true, but Mrs May should also look closer to home for the impact of fake news.

Last week, Mrs May attended a party to honour Paul Dacre’s 25th year as editor of the Daily Mail, the newspaper that has probably done more than any other to spread hatred of migrants and of the EU through misleading news.

Also yesterday, the European Commission announced that it is tackling fake news as part of a wider effort to protect democracy across Europe. 

This is in response to a resolution passed by the European Parliament last June, calling on the Commission to analyse the current situation and legal framework regarding fake news, and to verify the possibility of legislation to limit the spreading of fake news content

First Vice-President of the European Commission, Frans Timmermans said:

“The freedom to receive and impart information and the pluralism of the media are enshrined in the EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights.

He added: 

“We live in an era where the flow of information and misinformation has become almost overwhelming. That is why we need to give our citizens the tools to identify fake news, improve trust online, and manage the information they receive.”

The EU Commissioner for Digital Economy and Society, Mariya Gabriel said: 

“Fake news is a direct threat to the very foundations of our democratic society.”

Ms Gabriel announced the Commission’s plans to set up a ‘High-Level Expert Group’ representing academics, online platforms, news media and civil society organisations to look into the problem of fake news. There will also be wide level consultations with the public about the impact of fake news to conclude in February next year.

She said: 

“At the heart of my action lies the defence of citizens’ right to quality information which is a cornerstone of our democracies. I want to have an open and broad discussion about fake news to address this complex phenomenon in order to overcome the challenges ahead of us.”

Most internet traffic is spread through Google, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and Twitter. The Commissioner explained that fake news is easily disseminated with little effort via these US-owned platforms.

She added that people can purchase 20,000 comments for €5,000 and another €2,600 will buy up to 300,000 social media followers. “This type of manipulation is possible because there is an offer to provide these services,” she said.

Regulators are facing a difficult debate on balancing fake news and fundamental rights such as the freedom of expression.

Commented Andrus Ansip, the Commission’s Vice-President for the Digital Single Market 

“We need to find a balanced approach between the freedom of expression, media pluralism and a citizens’ right to access diverse and reliable information. All the relevant players like online platforms or news media should play a part in the solution.”

The Commission said that citizens, social media platforms, news organisations, researchers and public authorities are all invited to share their views in the public consultation until mid-February. The Commission added that it will, “gather opinions on what actions could be taken at EU level to give citizens effective tools to identify reliable and verified information and adapt to the challenges of the digital age. 

• My campaign, Reasons2Remain, is profoundly concerned about fake news being propagated by some of our leading newspapers to promote Brexit, in addition to the problem of social media being used to spread misinformation.

Jon Danzig giving his speech at an international media conference about newspaper lies.

► Watch my 14-minute video, ‘How fake news caused Brexit’. I shall be submitting this film and other evidence to the European Commission’s Public Consultation on Fake News.

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The post How fake news caused Brexit appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

On 22 November, the Subcommittee will discuss, with the involvement of 3 experts, risks and trends and their security implications for the EU as well as EU efforts to mitigate the security relevant effects of climate change. It will also examine to what extent increased economic/military activities, impact on desertification, land degradation, water and food scarcity can be linked to climate change and what major effects they have on EU security.
Location : Paul-Henri Spaak 5B001
Further information
Draft programme
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The next AFET meeting is scheduled to take place as follows:

Monday, 20 November 2017, 15:00-18:30, room JAN 2Q2;
Tuesday, 21 November 2017, 09:00-12:30 and 15:00-18:30, room JAN 2Q2.

Further information
Information for visitors
Draft agendas
Source : © European Union, 2017 - EP

Lounes
Citizenship of the Union
A non-EU national may benefit from a right of residence in the Member State in which his EU citizen family member resided before acquiring the nationality of that Member State in addition to her nationality of origin

APVE and Others
Competition
Concertation on price and quantities between several organisations of agricultural producers and associations of such organisations may constitute an agreement, decision or concerted practice for the purposes of competition law

Schrems
Area of Freedom, Security and Justice
According to Advocate General Bobek, Maximilian Schrems may be able to rely on his consumer status in order to sue Facebook Ireland before the Austrian Courts with respect to the private use of his own Facebook account

Length of video : 24'
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Disclaimer : The interpretation of debates serves to facilitate communication and does not constitute an authentic record of proceedings. Only the original speech or the revised written translation is authentic.
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The European Union participates for the first time in the 31st ASEAN Summit in Manila. The summit takes place on 13 and 14 November 2017 and marks the 50th anniversary of the foundation of ASEAN and coincides with the 40th anniversary of EU-ASEAN dialogue relations. The EU is represented by Donald Tusk, President of the European Council.

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DRAFT OPINION on discharge in respect of the implementation of the general budget of the European Union for the financial year 2016, Section X - European External Action Service
Committee on Foreign Affairs
Cristian Dan Preda

Source : © European Union, 2017 - EP

DRAFT OPINION on discharge in respect of the implementation of the general budget of the European Union for the financial year 2016, Section III - Commission and executive agencies
Committee on Foreign Affairs
Cristian Dan Preda

Source : © European Union, 2017 - EP

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EU Ministers of Foreign Affairs and Defence meet on 14 November 2017 in Brussels to discuss Africa-EU relations. Over lunch, foreign ministers are joined by defence ministers to discuss security and defence. Defence ministers are then discussing EU-NATO cooperation with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. The European Defence Agency's steering board meeting with the Defence ministers is taking place after the Foreign Affairs Council (defence). On the sidelines of the Council, those member states who intend to join the permanent structured cooperation (PESCO) are expected to jointly sign the notification letter addressed to the Council and the High Representative.

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The European Defence Agency (EDA) was created in July 2004 in the context of the drafting of the first European Security Strategy. In recent years, developments have triggered talks on the future of the EDA. In the context of the most recent CSDP innovations (EU Global Strategy, EDF, PESCO, CARD) this workshop will discuss the possible role of the Agency in framing a common Union defence policy and in defining a European capabilities and armaments policy.
Further information
Draft programme
Source : © European Union, 2017 - EP

DRAFT REPORT on a European Parliament recommendation to the Council, the Commission and the EEAS on cutting the sources of income for Jihadists – targeting the financing of terrorism
Committee on Foreign Affairs
Javier Nart

Source : © European Union, 2017 - EP

Source : © European Union, 2017 - EP

Remembrance Sunday is held in the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth as a day “to commemorate the contribution of British and Commonwealth military and civilian servicemen and women in the two World Wars and later conflicts”.

Of course, we must never forget those who gave their lives in service to our country. We especially owe a great debt to all those who helped to save this country – and the rest of Europe – from the terrible onslaught of the Nazi regime in the Second World War.

But as well as remembering all those who fought so hard and valiantly during times of war and conflict, we should also remember all those who worked so hard and valiantly to help to avoid wars and conflicts.

The European Economic Community – later to be called the European Union – was started in the aftermath of the Second World War with one purpose and one purpose alone: to avoid wars on our continent ever happening again.

That was the passionate resolve of those who are regarded as the eleven founders of the European Union, including our own war leader, Winston Churchill.

After all, Europe had a long and bloody history of resolving its differences through war, and indeed, the planet’s two world wars originated right here, on our continent.

So the EU was never just an economic agreement between nations.

It was always also meant to be a social and political union of European nations to enable them to find ways not just to trade together, but to co-exist and co-operate in harmony and peace on many levels as a community of nations.

The goal, in the founding document of the European Union called the Treaty of Rome, was to achieve ‘ever closer union among the peoples of Europe’ (which is rather different to ‘ever closer union of nations’.)

Just one year after the Second World War, in 1946, Winston Churchill made his famous speech in Zurich, Switzerland in which he said:

“We must build a kind of United States of Europe. The structure of the United States of Europe, if well and truly built, will be such as to make the material strength of a single state less important.”

At the time Churchill did not envisage Britain joining the new Union of Europe, but he was later to change his mind.

In March 1957 the European Economic Community (EEC) was established by its six founding nations, France, Italy, West Germany, Belgium, The Netherlands and Luxembourg.

This was a remarkable achievement, considering that these countries only a few years previously had been fighting in a most terrible war, and four of the founding nations had been viciously subjugated by another of the founders, Germany, during their Nazi regime.

In a speech four months later in July 1957 at Westminster’s Central Hall, Churchill welcomed the formation of the EEC by the six, provided that “the whole of free Europe will have access”. Churchill added, ”we genuinely wish to join..”

But Churchill also warned:

“If, on the other hand, the European trade community were to be permanently restricted to the six nations, the results might be worse than if nothing were done at all – worse for them as well as for us. It would tend not to unite Europe but to divide it – and not only in the economic field.”

Maybe this is the point that many Brexiters simply don’t get.

Here in Britain we don’t seem to understand the founding purpose of the European Union – and on the rest of the continent, they don’t understand why we don’t understand.

The European Union isn’t just about economics and trade, and never was.

It’s about peace, and a community of nations of our continent working together for the benefit and protection of its citizens.

We are now rebuffing our allies in Europe, telling them by our actions and words that the precious, remarkable and successful post-war project to find peace and security on our continent isn’t as important to us as it is to them.

Will our friendship and relationship with the rest of our continent ever recover?

• Photo: central Rotterdam on 14 May 1940 after the bombardment by German war planes.  Around 900 people died and vast swathes of the city were destroyed in the bombing. Almost 80,000 people lost their homes when parts of the city became ‘a sea of fire’. Photo: German federal archives via Wikimedia Commons.

• Watch Jon Danzig’s 8-minute video: ‘The EU was started for peace’

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The post The EU was started for one purpose: peace appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

On 9 May 1948, Winston Churchill, Britain’s war-time Prime Minister, addressed the European rally held in Amsterdam, during which he said:

THIS IS THE EUROPE which we wish to see arise in so great a strength as to be safe from internal disruption or foreign inroads.

We hope to reach again a Europe united but purged of the slavery of ancient, classical times, a Europe in which men will be proud to say:

‘I am a European.’

We hope to see a Europe where men of every country will think as much of being a European as of belonging to their native land, and that without losing any of their love and loyalty of their birthplace.

We hope wherever they go in this wide domain, to which we set no limits in the European Continent, they will truly feel:

‘Here I am at home. I am a citizen of this country too.’

Let us meet together. Let us work together. Let us do our utmost – all that is in us – for the good of all.

How simple it would all be, how crowned with blessings for all of us if that could ever come, especially for the children and young men and women now growing up in this tortured world.

How proud we should all be if we had played any useful part in bringing that great day to come. And here I invoke the interest of the broad, proletarian masses. We see before our eyes scores of millions of humble homes in Europe and in lands outside which have been afflicted by war.

Are they never to have a chance to thrive and flourish? Is the honest, faithful, breadwinner never to be able to reap the fruits of his labour? Can he never bring up his children in health and joy and with the hopes of better days?

Can he never be free from the fear of foreign invasion, the crash of the bomb and the shell, the tramp of the hostile patrol, or what is even worse, the knock upon his door by the political police to take the loved one from the protection of law and justice, when all the time by one spontaneous effort of his will he could wake from all these nightmare horrors and stand forth in his manhood, free in the broad light of day?

But if we are to achieve, this supreme reward we must lay aside every impediment; we must conquer ourselves.

We must rise to a level higher than the grievous injuries we have suffered or the deep hatreds they have caused. Old feuds must die. Territorial ambitions must be set aside.

National rivalries must be confined to the question as to who can render the most distinguished service to the common cause.

Moreover, we must take all necessary steps and particular precautions to make sure that we have the power and the time to carry out this transformation of the western world.

Much of this of course belongs to the responsibilities of the chosen governments responsible in so many countries.

But we have gathered together at The Hague, to proclaim here and to all the world the mission, the aim and the design of a United Europe, whose moral conceptions will win the respect and gratitude of mankind and whose physical strength will be such that none will dare molest her tranquil sway.

• Link to Churchill’s full address in Amsterdam on 9 May 1948

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A recently published book: “Wir können nicht allen helfen” – of which the title translates into English as we cannot help everyone – is about the moral dilemma now facing Germany as a consequence of the refugee crisis. The book is an account by Boris Palmer – the mayor of Tübingen, a town in the state of Baden-Würtemburg in Germany – who was responsible for providing accommodation for refugees in the summer of 2015, when there was an influx of hundreds of thousands of refugees into Germany. In the book Palmer debates the limits of Germany’s resilience when it comes to integrating over 1.16 million asylum seekers, who arrived in Germany over a period from 2015 to 2016.

The book is interesting because it is written by a green politician, who comes from a political tradition of left wing politics: which has always put the rights of minorities and disadvantaged groups such as refugees fleeing persecution as well as environmental protection at the centre of its policies. Therefore Palmer can inform the reader of the challenges and problems of mass immigration without having an anti-immigrant agenda, which would not have been the case if he had been a member of the right wing AfD party.

In 2015 the town of Tübingen had a population of 85,000 people. By the autumn of that year according to estimates the influx of refugees entering Germany had reached around 800,000, which was set to rise to over one million people at the start of 2016. Palmer explains that as the refugees were distributed to locations across Germany, Tübingen was expected to receive a proportion of one thousandth of the refugee population. This meant the town had to accommodate around 1000 extra people within a period of 18 months, which was likely to rise to around 2000 within a period of 30 months, if the numbers of refugees entering Germany had continued at the same rate. Many of the refugees had fled from the war in Syria and northern Iraq, and had reached Austria and Germany via the Balkan route after first passing through Turkey and Greece.

The first challenge for many local communities in Germany was to find temporary accommodation for the new arrivals. In Tübingen emergency accommodation was provided for refugees in the regional sports hall. This meant that local people had to find other sports venues, which they accepted in a spirit of good faith and solidarity under the exceptional circumstances. In the autumn of 2015 the local authority made 400 spaces available in the sports hall which soon filled up.

It was not long before conditions in the sports hall started to become unpleasant: there were protests and fights amongst some of those who were sheltering there; in February 2016 complaints were made by refugees to a local newspaper that they had been living at the sports centre for months; they also made complaints about the food provided by the local authority there. Employees of the local authority reported to Palmer that they had found the toilets in the sports centre in a terrible condition, saying excrement had been smeared on the toilet walls. A contributing factor to the bad behaviour in the sports hall was the consumption of alcohol by some of the men staying there.

In the book Palmer does not want to put all the blame for the disorder in the sports hall on the newcomers staying there, recognizing that if 400 local Schwabens had been put in such accommodation, it would have ended up with people fighting each other. Part of the problem for all local authorities at that time – after such a large and sudden influx of people – was that resources were overstretched, and it was difficult to find enough social housing for the newcomers.

Palmer wrote of the difficulty of trying to integrate large numbers of people into German society who did not speak German. He was concerned that politicians in central government had not considered the problems of finding employment for people who came from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and several African countries, many of whom had arrived in Germany without formal qualifications or training. It was estimated that 80 percent of the refugees would not be considered qualified in the German employment market; and that the integration of these people into the country’s employment market once all the necessary education and training had been provided would take a decade.

One of the concerns that many people in Germany had, was the large proportion of young single men among the refugees. Many of these men arrived without being accompanied by any of their family members. German parents of girls – fearing for the safety of their daughters – were willing to accept refugee families in their neighbourhoods, but were unhappy about the single men being accommodated nearby.

At the time of writing this review the reviewer is not aware that “Wir können nicht allen helfen” has been translated into English for sale in the United Kingdom. He bought a copy of the book in its original German language at a bookshop in Cologne, Germany, and has read it and then written a review of it in English. This book is very important to understand the political situation in Germany and the rest of Europe.

In 2015 Angela Merkel made a massive political miscalculation, by opening Germany’s borders to such a large influx of people who were not EU citizens. Many people in Germany have felt that the needs of refugees have been put before those of local people. For many Germans – who are struggling to hold down three minimum wage part time jobs, or are unemployed on Hartz IV subsistence benefit – the newcomers are seen as invaders competing for jobs and housing as well as pushing down pay and conditions for German workers. As a consequence of this situation the AfD was able to win around 13 percent of the vote in the German election of September 2017.

©Jolyon Gumbrell 2017

Sources

Palmer, Boris (2017) Wir können nicht allen helfen, Siedler Verlag München, ISBN 978-3-8275-0107-3.

https://www.randomhouse.de/Buch/Wir-koennen-nicht-allen-helfen/Boris-Palmer/Siedler/e526754.rhd

The review entitled “When it is impossible to help everyone” was first published on Jolyon’s Review on 10th November 2017 at http://jolyonsreview.co.uk/bookreviews.htm

The post When it is impossible to help everyone appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

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The EU has strengthened its relationship with the Central Asian countries (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan) since the adoption of  "The EU and Central Asia: Strategy for a New Partnership ” in 2007.

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Plenary session and committee meetings in Strasbourg

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