Euromedia

Back from Davos

I just returned from the World Economic Forum and compared to past editions this year antiamericanism was harder to track for lack of...Americans. The absence of high profile representatives from the Bush Administration was due perhaps to the fact that many of them have not yet "passed their exams" at the Congress, but it was widely interpreted by Europeans as a proof that this Administration just does not care about the US image in the rest of the world.

Turkey: a bridge to the future, a bridge to the past

The European Union is faced with a difficult decision. If it doesn't allow Turkey to join the EU, it could be viewed as further proof of the "clash" between the Muslim world and the west. If it does allow Turkey to join, it faces a potential wave of immigrants that people aren't ready for or fully accepting. And, with open borders and Turkey's neighbors, obvious security concerns.

Europeans praise themselves for their ability to overcome the past, by creating things like a European Defense Agency 90 years after World War I and only 15 years after the fall of Communism. But to turn its attention away from overcoming centuries of exclusion and battles against the Muslim world and the Turks would be to ignore a much more pressing issue.

International Herald Tribune -Is EU ready for Turkey? Muslim world is waiting

Britain VS Geneva

What's the position of Europe toward the Iraqui prisoners' scndal? If Britain knew, and was partly responsible, how do the Europeans feel about the violation of the Geneva convention?

"Les photos sont choquantes, mais nos rapports sont pires", accuse la Croix-Rouge
LE MONDE | 05.05.04

Europhobic Britain

Here is a French article about Tony Blair's position towards the EU Constitution and the British Referendum. The article explains pretty clearly the strategic reasons why the Premier supported the idea of a referendum, and the general Europhobic feelings throughout the country...
British citizens apparently need to be reassured about the "scary" idea of being part of a new United States of Europe...

Le Monde, "Tony Blair soumettra la Constitution de l'UE à un référendum", 4/21/04

EU: No thank you say Swiss

The Tories (and however many Britons don't want to be in the "centre of Europeand decision-making", as Tony Blair put it) can turn to Switzerland and Norway for reasons why it's not necessary to join the EU.

The Swiss are prosperous and content with its relationship with the EU, its major trade partner. NOrway, as this Telegraph article points out, has grown twice as much as the UK in the last 30 years.

They don't have to deal with their business being over-regulated, they don't have to deal with the burden of rebuilding Eastern European countries like Poland and the Czech Republic and they don't have to balance what some consider the teetering weight of 25 member-nations.

Telegraph - 'The EU? It's political suicide to mention it in Switzerland'

Basics of the draft EU Constitution

Very brief and clear introduction by the BBC to the ideas in the draft of EU Constitution. I found it useful, as I didn't really know all these issues before. Take a look...

It's an interactive page on the BBC

Drifting apart

An American columnist goes back to Europe after many years, and is surprised by Europeans feelings about the US, and Bush in particular. Sensitive to a traditional understanding of power (he cites Kagan) he writes that: "Europe is too weak to lead and too proud to follow." Nevertheless, he understands that Europeans attitude towards netotiations comes from their capacity to "control historical hatreds through the EU."

There a re a lot of interesting considerations in this column, starting with the basic one which is that "we are drifiting."

The Washington Post - Drifting Apart

America Has Second Thoughts About a United Europe

This article by Roger Cohen, on The New York Times' Week in Review of Sunday, May 2nd, explains the changing attitudes of the US towards "Europe at 25".

Europe vs. the Corner Store

The fate of a little grocery in Budapest is a symbol of anxious times as the EU grows.
By András Szántó on the Los Angeles Times, Sunday, May 2nd.

A European perception of the American perception

This is an article on how the French perceive the American view of the enlargement... Mixed feelings. The basic idea is that Washington hopes the new members will make the EU more pro-american. Some neocons, though, believe that a bigger Europe will slowly drift away, and be more independent.

According to a European observer in Washington, the Americans "don't understand the European Union." It looks too much like NATO. Anyway, they are too busy dealing with Iraq and the coming presidential election.

Le MOnde - L'Amérique espère que l'Union à 25 penchera du côté de la "nouvelle Europe"

Berlin-Madrid-Paris

Zapatero is moving fast in international affair. After going first to Rabat, he went to Paris where the creation of a new Berlin-Madrid-Paris troika was announced. The participation of a middle size country might have a significant impact on European dynamics.

It has been officially said that Madrid will play a role in the relationships with the Magreb, that is with part of the Arab and Muslim world. Spain is in an excellent position to be a bridge between many worlds.

El País - Chirac anuncia la creación de un nuevo eje Berlín-Paris-Madrid

Chirac sees long timetable for Turkey's integration

In a press conference Jacques Chirac postponed the possibility of accepting Turkey in the EU for 10 to 15 more years. One of the parties of his majority coalition opposes it. The French President said that it is "an important issue" and that it should be accpeted trhough parliamentary vote or referendum by all EU members. This could be a verylong process indeed...

Le Monde - Chirac repousse à dix ans l'adhésion de la Turquie

Cyprus, the paradoxe of EU

A few days before the crucial birth-day of the EU enlargement (May 1), the Greek population of Cyprus voted against the "fusion" with the Turkish side of the island. By this, they basically excluded the Turkish Cyprus from the European Union. Paradoxically, this ended up approaching the Cyprian Turkish people to Europe (EU foreign ministers decided to help the Turkish side with 259 million Euros, and a partial suspension of the embargo).
Tomorrow, Le Monde will publish a special 20-page issue ("L'Europe, un continent neuf") dedicated to the enlargement. I hope it will be available online.
For us, the "old" Europeans, all this is a big deal. Can you imagine? 25 members, 188 regions, 450 million citizens, and 20 languages...
Being a "European citizen" is much more exiting than being just an Italian one!

"Les Européens veulent mettre fin à l'isolement de la partie turque de Chypre et l'aider à se relever", Le Monde, 4/27/04.

Militants in Europe Openly Call for Jihad and the Rule of Islam

This New York Times story is about a small group of young Pakistani-British who have turned openly simpathetic to Al Qaeda. It evokes exactly what many Europeans fear most: that Muslim immigrants may become (or already are) "the Inside Enemy". This fear seems more acute in Europe than in the US.

Cultural integration?

European's know their common cultural past, but they ignore each other's contemporary artists and intellectuals, writes Alan Riding who adds: "As Europe moves toward "ever closer union," unless it also communicates culturally, popular taste will become ever more American."

The article mentions a number of limited efforts, explaining that they are unsuccessful, while failing to underline that they are numerous. This could be an excellent image of what we are seeing in other fields: myriads of small things contributing unsatisfactorily to a greater integration because they pale in comparison to the idea of Europe. These perceptions are not incompatible, and we should learn to deal with them if we want to better understand what's really happening.

The New York Times - A Common Culture (From the U.S.A.) Binds Europeans Ever Closer

Dawn of new NATO cooperation?

This is a little peach of a story. As I run around reporting on static between U.S. and European defense constractors, here's a nice piece in the New York Times and the BBC about NATO awarding a contract for 4 billion euros to a trans-Atlantic consortium, led by EADS and Northrup Grumman. Perhaps this will usher in a new dawn of joint procurement for the alliance, the Times reports.

Cooperation throughout Europe is something we've heard, European companies wanting in on juicy U.S. defense contracts, but is this really a new cooperation across the Atlantic?

There was another bidder, also a trans-Atlantic consortium.

New York Times - New Unity on Contracts Seen in NATO

BBC - EADS wins 'eye in sky' contract

Spain: terrorists or vandals?

The body of the police officer who died on April 4th while trying to arrest part of the commando accused of the attacks of 3/11 was taken out of its tomb and burnt in the cemetery. The police does not know if it's an act of revenge linked to the operation or the action of vandals.

El País - Profanada la tumba y quemado el cadáver del geo muerto en la explosión de Leganés

Tolerance, fears collide in Netherlands

This clanging port city on the Rotte River is a study in European immigration. One-third of Rotterdam's population of 600,000 are minimally educated immigrants with little command of the Dutch language. If trends continue, according to a city government study, the non-native community will grow about 58 percent by 2017 - a dramatic demographic shift in a nation where half a century ago there were few foreigners.

I'm looking at immigration for my story, browsing at some different country cases. This one really affected me. It says so much about the collision of new fears about terrorism and buried xenophobic feelings in some European countries. I know personally, some distant relatives in Holland are worried that they will be deported to Afghanistan because the government is now relatively stable. That is the case in the US too. The illegal immigrants caught up in the special registration webs often are sent back to countries when it may not be safe for them. In the case of the Palestinians, there is no state to be sent back to. What strange times we live in ...

Tolerance, Fear Collide in Neatherlands, Los Angeles Times

Europeans share values, but not a common identity

TRIESTE, Italy – From the battles of ancient Greece to the violent dismemberment of Yugoslavia, Europeans have generally seemed more intent on clubbing each other than on clubbing together. The Romans walloped their neighbors. Catholics and Protestants shared God but couldn't agree on much else. The French and British irritated each other nonstop. And that was before the world wars and genocide of the 20th century.

This article doesn't say many surprising things about identity, but I think it pulls together many themes quite well. For example, did you know the Pope is against European unity?

Nations Struggle to Find Common Threads, Associated Press

Spains plan against international terrorism

Several American newspapers have published first page articles on Spain's Prime Minister decision to order soldiers home from Iraq. The New York Times, for instance, explains that Rodriguez Zapatero decided to do so within 24 hours after he assumed his new post "" to avoid being drawn into a debate or to avoid complications in the field."

The El País story is a welcome complement. It explains that the new Minister of the Interior is making international terrorism his first priority. It will imply more resources, a reorganization of agencies and a more intense international cooperation.

El País - El Gobierno prepara un plan especial de lucha contra el terrorismo internacional

Ships in the night?

Is Spain like a ship passing France and Germany in the night? As Zapatero follows through on his pledge to remove Spanish troops from Iraq, and others (okay, Honduras) pledge to do the same, Germany and France are heading toward rapproachement, according to this piece.

This story, although a little over a week old, focuses on Franco-German efforts to narrow the rift of trans-Atlantic relations.

Here we've talked about the push for more autonomy, for a greater presence in global security but as this writer points out, the rest of Europe is not ready for the "French-German drive for European pre-eminence."

Consider this Védrine comment on France and other countries intervening "if the Iraqis ask for it."

If there were a new French role in relation to Iraq, he said, it would not "simply be to help the Americans, but the Iraqis."

Iraq needs help, and that means the U.S. needs help, but when are the Iraqis going to ask for it?

Some French newspapers already see the need to step in, Vinokur points out:

Le Figaro, in an editorial, said that since the United States was not going to clear out of Iraq, "France would be well advised to abstain from diplomatically harassing its ally on the question of the handover of power, and to stop continuously referring everything to the United Nations."

http://www.iht.com/articles/514175.html

International Herald Tribune - News Analysis: Germany and France staying mum

Antwerp: the next target for terrorist attack?

Here are a few different newspapers spinning the same story: the Arabic European League (AEL)--lots of membership in Belgium and Netherlands--has "warned" traders in Antwerp that they could be the next target of a terrorist attacks.

The majority of traders in Antwerp are Jewish with strong ties to Israel.

Newspaper accounts differ from calling it "Islamic fundamentalist threat" to "Hamas" to a general "terrorism threat"

This was an aspect I didn't expect to cover in Antwerp initially, but from my reporting there, tensions at the business person-to-person level between Muslims and Jews was very little. But so is the interaction. The majority of traders are Hindu, not Muslim. Though these supposed threats are not from the immediate community.

For the most part, people felt (obviously i'm not there now) very safe and had little to say about March 11. September 11, was tragic, they said, but far away.

This is a blurb from a diamond industry trade magazine published by the International Diamond Exchange.
Antwerp's diamond traders fear terror attacks
http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=24&story_id=6478

This is the belgium expats mag's take
Antwerp Security Tightened Following Threats
http://www.idexonline.com/start.asp

Reuters
Belgium Investigates Email Threats Against Jews
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=4794541

Israeli news
Belgian Jews Threatened By Euro-Arab League
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/news.php3?id=60711

Witty New Yorker read on French bachelors abroad

O.k., so it's off topic, but considering our travels and our group's encounters with proposals for dates and even marriage, the article seems worth a smile for the play on stereotypes.

It's a small vignette in the New Yorker on a group of NY-based French bachelor businessmen who've started cocktail parties ("French Tuesdays"). The group of French expatriates has grown so big that Playboy magazine sponsored the last one where Rachel Hunter was the guest of honor.

It makes interesting observations about what the group considers a way to socialize in "the French way." The comments of the French men's views of American women and men are the best. ("American girls are very liberated, but the American men are uptight." "We French, we think the Americans are too gentlemen, they are afraid of the girls. So we make sure the girls don't get ignored.")

Some of this rang true in our travels, I think.

It's online!
PEPE LE PEW DEPT.
BRUSH-OFF
By Leslie Schillinger
http://www.newyorker.com/talk/content/?040412ta_talk_schillinger

or April 12, 2004 New Yorker (Eggs on the cover). It's page 30.

French right oppose's Turkey's candidacy

In France, the President's party has decided to publicly oppose Turkey's candidacy to the EU. The official position, which is that of the Union, is a "technical" one: if Turkey complies with the crtieria applied to all the others by the end of 2004, negotiations will start.

The French right is now saying that Europe needs to fix its "limits" and that accepting Turkey would "change its nature." Valery Giscard d'Estain, an ex-president who recently headed the process for drafting a constitution has the same position. It is a point of agreement with the extreme right and they want to make it an issue during the coming European election. It goes along the lines of those who in several European countires (Germany and Denmark, among others) insist on the "Christian" nature of Europe.

Some people on the left (Balibar among them) think that the richness of Europe comes from its inherent and historical diversity, but opposing Turkey's entry plays with powerful racist feelings that can be found accross the political spectrum. The issue is essential for the evolution of the EU, for the definition of Europe's identity, and for its relations with the Muslim world.

Le Monde

"Entente cordiale" revisited

Rujun was right to pick-up a story on the 100th anniversary of "entente cordiale" (see below). It shows the strange, and contradictory feelings that exist between the "biftecks" as the French at times call the Brits, and the Frogs. In a sense, it could be a useful metaphor of the contradictory and strange feelings that most Europeans experiment about each other.

I just wanted to add this one from The New York Times. Their Paris correspondent, Alan Riding, knows a lot, and has a great sense of humor. He suggests that the French like the Queen because of her German blood. I wonder if I like what he writes, because (not only) he is a British citizen.

The New York Times