Section: European Voice (EU)
The strange career of Günther Oettinger
Günther Oettinger has never been one to bite his tongue. There was that time back in 2000 when he broke into the banned “Deutschland,-Deutschland-über-Alles” verse at a celebration of his German nationalist fraternity. Or the time as Baden-Württemberg premier he lamented that Germany was surrounded by friendly neighbors: “The unfortunate thing...
Democrats’ retort to FBI: What about Trump and Russia?
Amid a potentially lethal frenzy about renewed FBI activity related to Hillary Clinton’s email, the Clinton campaign and its Democratic allies worked furiously on Monday to change the subject to FBI interest in Donald Trump’s ties to Russia. Democrats have complained for weeks that FBI Director James Comey has refused to discuss his...
UK spy chief warns of Russia threat
The escalating sophistication of Russia’s espionage and increasing threat of home-grown extremism has led British spy agency MI5 to hire hundreds more agents, its chief told the Guardian in an interview published Tuesday. While threats are rising globally, MI5’s Director General Andrew Parker singled out Russia as the most prominent...
Dutch government delays Ukraine trade deal decision
The Dutch government on Monday delayed a decision on whether to back an EU trade deal with Ukraine or support the result of a public referendum that rejected it. Prime Minister Mark Rutte wrote to MPs to say that he needed more time to persuade opposition parties to back the deal but that he hoped agreement could be reached before the next summit...
Georgian ruling party wins in disputed polls
Georgia’s ruling party scored a landslide victory in the second round of parliamentary polls, according to official results issued Monday. Pro-Western Georgian Dream won just under 49 percent of the vote in a first round on October 8. The United National Movement (UNM) came second, at just over 27 percent. The first round also saw the...
Russia falls back in love with Ivan the Terrible
ORYOL, Russia — In 1947, Josef Stalin summoned film director Sergei Eisenstein to the Kremlin to discuss his movie, “Ivan the Terrible.” While Stalin had enjoyed the first installment of the masterpiece, released three years earlier, he intensely disliked the sequel, then in production, which depicted the czar’s descent into paranoia and...
Frans Timmermans urges Dutch opposition to back Ukraine deal
European Commission’s First Vice President Frans Timmermans on Saturday called on opposition parties in the Dutch parliament to support the EU-Ukraine Association Agreement even though voters in the Netherlands rejected it at a referendum in April. In an interview with the Dutch public radio, Timmermans said that a “non-binding referendum...
POLITICO Brussels Playbook Plus: For the love of country or Parliament? — Lone Woolfe — Brexitometer
For the love of country or Parliament? The race for the European People’s Party nomination for European Parliament president is looking like a dead heat between French MEP Alain Lamassoure and Irish MEP Mairead McGuinness. While Germans in the group are firmly behind McGuinness, left leaners in the center-right bloc have questioned what her...
EU grants Russian gas giant go-ahead to expand in Europe, politics aside
Despite deepening strain between Moscow and the West, the European Commission has given approval to a Russian gas giant to carry more gas along a pipeline in Germany — drawing the ire of Ukraine and Poland. The Commission’s Friday night green light comes in response to a years-long debate over whether Russia’s state-owned Gazprom...
NATO chief: Numbers don’t add up to a new Cold War
For Jens Stoltenberg, the former Norwegian prime minister and one-time government statistician who is now the 13th secretary general of NATO, even the highest-stakes military and political problems can often be reduced to simple math. Asked in an interview with POLITICO if he worried that the four new NATO battalions to be stationed in eastern...
