But EU leaders have been working extremely hard in recent months to maintain a high level of unity as they confront the twin challenges of Brexit and a wave of right-wing populism — and they have largely seemed to be succeeding. Pro-European candidates have emerged victorious in a string of elections, including in the Netherlands and France, and the EU has seemed to take the upper hand in the early stages of negotiations with the U.K.
But Juncker’s fury over the the fact that perhaps just 30 of the 751 MEPs managed to attend the plenary for the speech by Maltese Prime Minister Joseph Muscat apparently overwhelmed his normal efforts to portray the bloc as working in tight cohesion for the benefit of European citizens. [...]
Among the punctual MEPs present to hear Juncker and Muscat speak were: the president of the Greens group, Philippe Lamberts, who is Belgian; Tanja Fajon, a Socialist from Slovenia; and David Casa, a Maltese member of EPP. [...]
Juncker, who is a former prime minister of Luxembourg, had said earlier that he believed the absence of MEPs was a clear sign of disrespect to Malta, the smallest EU country. He added that if German Chancellor Angela Merkel or French President Emmanuel Macron had been giving a speech instead, “We would have a full house.”
No comments:
Post a Comment