European Elections: Candidates spar in live EU TV debate

With flashes of wit, much earnestness and a certain reluctance to go for the jugular of their opponents, four candidates for the European Commission presidency broke new ground on Monday night by holding a live televised debate designed to drum up public interest in the May 22-25 elections for the European parliament.

If social media are one measure of that interest, the debate may have worked. Halfway through the 90-minute programme, broadcast from the Dutch city of Maastricht, an organiser announced that 10,000 tweets a minute were coming in.

The harder question to answer is whether any candidate did enough to convince potential voters that the elections will truly make a difference in a EU blighted by a long recession, mass unemployment and a squeezed welfare state.

Although the debate never turned nasty, Ska Keller, the Greens candidate, got in a sharp jab at Jean-Claude Juncker, the centre-right candidate, when she accused him of “presiding over a tax haven” during his time as prime minister of Luxembourg. An indignant Mr Juncker rejected the charge and managed later to slip in the image-softening remark that one reason why he favoured a EU-wide minimum wage was that he remembered his father’s tough life as a steelworker.

Guy Verhofstadt, a former Belgian prime minister who is the centrist, liberal candidate, turned his fire on José Manuel Barroso, the outgoing Commission president, saying Mr Barroso had never taken a decision without first flying to Berlin and Paris to get the green light. “The Commission needs to lead,” he thundered.

He also put Mr Juncker on the spot by challenging him to explain why his centre-right group still included Silvio Berlusconi, the former Italian prime minister, who caused outrage last weekend by suggesting Germans denied the existence of Nazi concentration camps. But Mr Juncker hit back with the succinct sentence: “I was sickened by the statements of Mr Berlusconi.”

Martin Schulz, the centre-left candidate, made a valiant effort to distinguish himself from the other three by repeating on several occasions that he was against a Europe of “banks and speculators”.

When the debate moved on to Europe’s insurgent far-right parties, he spoke with some passion in saying he found it “unimaginable” as a German that “a Nazi party could sit in the European parliament and make propaganda for the party of Adolf Hitler”.

Read more: Candidates spar in live EU TV debate | Brussels blog

Benefits of EU Membership: Czech economy would be in the tank without EU membership

If the Czech Republic was not a member of the European Union, its gross domestic product (GDP) for 2013 would be 12 percent lower than it was, the Czech state secretary for European affairs, Tomáš Prouza, said at a business forum during the visit of European Council President Herman Van Rompuy to Prague.

Prouza presented the results of an economic study that several important economists have prepared for the Government Office.

"If we were not an EU member, could not take advantage of the single market and had no revenues from the Cohesion Policy, Czech GDP for the past year would be some 12 percent lower than it was," Prouza said.

"If we were not in the EU, there would have been almost no change in the level of incomes of Czech citizens vis-à-vis Western Europe in the 18 years since 1995," he added.

If the Czech Republic was a eurozone member, the revenue of the Czech economy would increase 25 billion Kč to 60 billion Kč annually, and domestic GDP would be between 0.6 percent and 1.2 percent higher.

"If we became a eurozone member in 2007 like Slovakia did, the contribution would be some 270 billion Kč," Prouza said.

The study puts the direct cost of eurozone membership, that is the potential contribution to the European Stability Mechanism, at 35 billion Kč.

The study shows that during EU membership, the Czech economy has gained 770 billion Kč. Without the internal market, its GDP would be 2.5 percent lower and unemployment 1.5 percent higher.

"If it were not for the internal market, if the barriers that were here before our entry to the EU stayed in place, the higher costs, lower trade volume, smaller exports and lack of foreign investments would have deprived us of some 100 billion Kč annually and another 75,000 people would be jobless," Prouza said at the business forum.

Since 2004, EU membership has brought 3.1 trillion Kč to the Czech Republic. The membership thus brought more than the Czech economy produced in 2004: some 300,000 Kč per person.

Read more: Czech economy would be in the tank without EU membership - PRAGUE POST | The Voice of Prague

Terrorism: France to stop citizens joining Syria war - EU member state Governments and EU parliament must also act

Aljazeera reported that France has unveiled steps to stop its citizens from joining the Syrian civil war and prevent young French Muslims from posing a threat to their home country.

France, which has been a staunch opponent of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, estimates the number of its nationals directly involved in the Syrian conflict is about 500, Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said in a radio interview.

President Francois Hollande has prioritized the crackdown on groups and individuals planning domestic attacks since a Toulouse-based al Qaeda-inspired gunman, Mohamed Merah, shot dead seven people in March 2012.

But with the Syrian conflict entering its fourth year, the government has increasingly come under fire for failing to stop its nationals - some of whom are as young as 15 - from heading to Syria.

"France will take all measures to dissuade, prevent and punish those who are tempted to fight where they have no reason to be," Hollande told reporters on Tuesday.

The Dutch Government also reported recently that two Dutch Muslim nationals, who are part of a group of at least 150 other Dutch citizens, who have joined radical Muslim groups like ISIS, Al Qaeda and others  in Syria,  blew themselves up in suicide attacks in Syria and Iraq.

As ISIS’s name suggests, the interests of the group and its current leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi go beyond Syria. Its members believe that the world's Muslims should live under one Islamic state ruled by sharia law. 

War and instability in Syria and Iraq have given it an opportunity to attempt to build a proto-state in the adjacent Sunni-majority areas of these two countries, before spreading further. 

Its 7,000 or so fighters in Syria have expended as much energy on consolidating the group’s rule in towns and cities behind rebel lines as fighting the regime. ISIS is willing to use ruthless tactics to assert its authority. 

Once in control of an area it has told women to cover up and kidnapped journalists, aid workers and Syrian activists. Beheadings and suicide bombings are now a regular feature of ISIS There are also many other EU Muslim citizen, including Germany and Britain, who have voluntarily joined radical Muslim groups like ISIS in  the Syrian conflict.

Many people fear that "rebel fighters" returning home to Europe will have become so radicalized that they could become a danger to their local societies.

There seems to be an urgent need for EU member state Governments and the EU Parliament to legislate laws which forbid and punish anyEuropean citizen for joining external conflicts or radical fighting Units.

EU-Digest

Energy-Fracking: British Poll finds: Wind farms more popular than fracking sites - Fracking dangerous to your health

Fracking good for the corporate world - but not for your health

More people would prefer a wind farm in their local council area than a fracking site, according to research published recently by YouGov for the renewables company, Ecotricity.

When asked “Which of the following energy projects or plans would you prefer to have operating in your council area”, 62% said a wind farm, 19% said a fracking site and 19% said they didn’t know.

The research found that a wind farm was more popular than a fracking site, regardless of political opinion.

The preference for wind farms was lowest UKIP and Conservative supporters and highest among Lib Dem and Labour supporters

Conservatives: 50% chose wind, 33% chose fracking, 17% did not know
Labour: 76% chose wind, 9% chosefracking, 14% did not know
Lib Dem: 78% chose wind,14% chosefracking, 8% did not know
UKIP (Eurosceptics): 41% chose wind, 36%chose fracking, 24% did not know

Interesting note about these figures is that the Conservatives and the right-wing UKIP Eurosceptics had the least understanding of what fracking is all about.

Women were more likely to support wind farms than men. The research found that among women, 68% of women would prefer a wind farm, compared with 9% who would prefer a fracking site. The figures for men were: 56% would prefer a wind farm, compared with 29% a fracking site.

Fracking was more popular in older people. According to the research, of those that preferred fracking over wind, 29% were over 60.

To watch a video on what Fracking does to the environment and your health click here.

EU-Digest

EU -Turkey: Economic integration should come first - by Angelo Santagostino

In the past fortnight, two interesting reports by the Independent Commission (IC) and the World Bank (WB) on Turkey’s relation with the EU have been released. Both give an insightful view of the situation concerning the bilateral relations between EU-28 and a negotiating candidate state such as Turkey. Both share a common view concerning the foreseeable developments of economic integration between both parties.

In the chapter on the Turkish economy, the IC states, “Beyond existing trade, there is much potential for trade between the EU and Turkey in the field of services and public procurement, as well as agricultural goods, were the EU-Turkey custom union to be extended to these two sectors.” This possible development however, was not resumed in the conclusion, where “a credible accession process” is considered the main road for Turkey “to jump into the high income country category.”

Nevertheless, no statement on the opening of Chapters 1 and 3 on the free movement of goods and on the right of establishment and freedom to provide services can be found in the report.

The IC calls for a reset in the accession process this year in order to generate an impact on reform (like the one of 2001-2) and considers that, “there is no better place to start than to open Chapters 23 and 24 in accession talks on the judiciary and fundamental rights, and justice, freedom and security.” 

Read more: EU-Turkey: Economic integration should come first - CONTRIBUTOR

Europe, Russia Ensnared in 'Energy Cold War,' Experts Say - by Alan Neuhauser and Paul D. Shinkman

Europe and Russia have become locked in an “energy cold war,” experts say, walking a razor’s edge between mutual economic dependence and “mutually assured economic destruction.”

“If someone makes a wrong move on this economy or energy war game, everyone can lose,” says Paul Sullivan, a professor of economics at National Defense University and an adjunct professor at Georgetown University.

“Europe depends on the Russians. The Russians depend on Europe. The question is who’s going to blink?”

The situation grew ever more precarious Thursday when Russian President Vladimir Putin threatened to completely shut down the country’s gas pipelines to Ukraine — and, by extension, parts of Western Europe — if Ukraine didn’t pay off the $2.2 billion it owes the Russian-owned gas giant Gazprom.

Yet as much as a gas freeze would cripple the Ukrainian economy and hurt Western Europe, it would also affect Russia — and the consequences for both sides, if allowed to fester, could ultimately prove disastrous.

Read more: Europe, Russia Ensnared in 'Energy Cold War,' Experts Say - US News

Britain: Exit EU, Scrapping Regulations and Business Ethics to benefit Britain, says winner prize for "best UK exit plan" from EU

Corporate control, no rules and regulations,  no business ethics, manipulation of food through bio-engineering,  wile Government and people are left to the mercy of  powerful lobby groups. This is what Britain would look like, say some International Economists, if they would follow Ian Mansfield plan for quitting the EU.

But Britain's free market Institute of Economic Affairs thought differently applauded this plan recently by awarding a 100,000-euro prize to Iain Mansfield, a British diplomat based in the Philippines, who it decided had come up with the best blueprint for a 'Brexit,' a British departure from the EU.

Reuters reports that amid widespread public disenchantment in Britain about the EU's perceived over-bearing role in everyday life Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron has promised to give Britons a referendum on leaving the EU in 2017 if he is re-elected next year.

Many British opinion polls suggest a slim majority would vote to leave the 28-nation bloc and that the anti-EU UK Independence Party (UKIP) is on course to come first or second in elections to the European Parliament next month.

Mansfield said Britain could join the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) to avoid bureaucratic burdens on business linked to Britain's membership of the EU, saying it could position itself as somewhere between Switzerland and Turkey, neither of which are EU member states.

What Mr Mansfield, Eurosceptics and PM Cameron don't seem to understand is that" you can't have your cake and eat it too ! "

EU-Digest