No. 227 April 9th 2021.

Text highlighted in Green in the links or underlined here, lead to other articles.

Sanctions, genocide & Mairead Mc Guinness

When Mairead McGuinness was crowned EU Commissioner for Financial Services the Irish establishment was delighted. There was a media fanfare. Despite the many column inches there was not a word that her portfolio involves overseeing financial sanctions against unfortunate states around the world. It can hardly have been an oversight. EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s “Mission Letter” to Commissioner McGuinness made it clear: “I want you to ensure that the sanctions imposed by the EU are properly enforced, notably throughout its financial system.”

Read more here The short story of the painful 3% deficit limit

Back in the heyday of the euro-zone crisis, French newspaper Le Parisien interviewed Guy Abeille (pictured), a senior official at the French Finance Ministry who is thought to have 'invented' the 3% deficit-to-GDP limit later enshrined in the EU treaties and the cornerstone of the Stability and Growth Pact. Here in Ireland, it resulted in the ‘dirty dozen’ cuts – and who remembers those now?

Read more here

Karlsruhe blocks EU Recovery Fund!

Germany’s highest court has put the EU’s flagship economic policy response to the pandemic at stake and legal experts say it could be difficult to find a solution to the situation. The German constitutional court in Karlsruhe decided to block the country’s president from ratifying the recovery fund in response to a motion filed earlier this year.

Read more here

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Ireland’s “Prior obligations corresponding to .... [those] of the signatories of the North Atlantic Treaty.”

A joint Spanish-Dutch “non-paper” on EU strategic autonomy indicates for the first time in the final paragraph below – taking into account the prior obligations undertaken by Member States, notably those corresponding to the signatories of the North Atlantic Treaty - that non-NATO EU Member States made a commitment to match the financial obligations of NATO Member States. This is a natural follow- on from the EU Council declaration of 26th Feb 2021. In Ireland’s case, it means at least a six-fold increase in military spending to achieve the PESCO - and NATO - target of 2% of GNP. Read more here

Click above.

EU propaganda reaches new heights

Paschal Donohoe, Finance Minister and president of the Eurogroup, has written an article claiming that the budgetary response of the EU and US to the pandemic has been more or less similar. Economist, Thomas Fazi has debunked such claims, showing that the fiscal responses of the EU and US are not even remotely comparable. The truth is that throughout the pandemic the EU/Eurozone has proven once again to be utterly dysfunctional, in macroeconomic as well as in organisational terms.

Read more here and here

“We Live in a Dangerous World!”

Remember Wolfgang Schäuble, the German Finance Minister who was particularly harsh on Ireland and Greece in the aftermath of the Banking Crisis? Well, he’s now Bundestag President and is turning his attention to the creation of an EU army. No surprise, neoliberalism and militarism are common bedfellows.

Under the eye-catching headline “Germans would be ready to renounce national army” the mainstream daily newspaper Die Welt promotes Herr Schäuble’s new book and his view that what the EU needs is a “Franco-German Brigade” under the leadership of Paris, of course. For obvious reasons...... !

Read more here.

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The right and obligation to say No to CETA!

The Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) is a free trade agreement between the EU and Canada. It removes all tariffs on industrial products between the EU and Canada. The agreement has been provisionally implemented since 21 September 2017 bringing most if not all of the agreement into force. The controversial Investment Court System has not been provisionally applied and will not come into force unless CETA is ratified by Canada and EU Member States.

According to the UN Independent Expert on the promotion of a democratic and equitable international order, CETA ‘is a corporate-driven, fundamentally flawed treaty’ which likely ‘will dilute environmental standards, food security and health and labour protection’

Read more here Jens-Peter Bonde.

The death has occurred of former Danish MEP Jens-Peter Bonde who for decades was a well – known activist in the international EU-critical movement.

Jens-Peter was a friend of this country and latterly was very helpful towards the People’s Movement, including helping in our office during Lisbon 2. He first came to Ireland at the time of Ireland's EEC Accession Treaty referendum in 1972. He subsequently assisted Raymond Crotty in running his challenge regarding the Single European Act treaty in 1986. Bonde was elected to the EU Parliament in the first election in 1979 with the People's Movement against the EU being re- elected 6 times consecutively. He was a co- founder of the TEAM network of democratic EU-critical organisations in 1992 and co-founded the June Movement which he chaired and represented in the EU Parliament until his retirement in May 2008.

Bonde wrote over 60 books on the EU, including editions of EU treaties with additional commentary including The Lisbon Treaty: the readable version.

The EU Commission Lobbying Techniques of Big Tobacco!

Big Tobacco has been influencing EU policy to its advantage for decades—postponing, protesting, promoting untruths, playing the victim and pushing new technologies—in order to disrupt tobacco control policies. The WHO’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) is the best global tool to combat tobacco industry interference, providing clear guidelines to protect public health policies and reduce tobacco-related deaths. A new report analyses the key contacts between the EU Commission and the tobacco industry. Download a brief here to read about the seven identified tactics Big Tobacco uses to lobby the EU.

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There are sanctions and then there are EU sanctions.

There are sanctions and then there are EU sanctions. Punitive sanctions aimed at an enemy state and its citizens go on endlessly, but those imposed on the former leader of a friendly state seem to come to a close at the whim of the EU Council.

Take the case of Hosni Mubarak, the former president of Egypt. He misappropriated billions of state funds. In 2011 the EU imposed sanctions against him and his close associates. A sum of $644m was uncovered in Swiss banks and frozen. Mubarak’s family successfully challenged the 2016 and 2018 sanctions. Nevertheless, the 2019-2020 sanctions remained resulting in any funds linked to the Mubarak’s stayed frozen. But not for long, as all Egyptian sanctions were lifted on 12th March 2021.

This means that the frozen funds in the names of the Mubarak’s and eight other Egyptians responsible for state corruption will have these $millions returned to them and not to Egypt’s public purse. The EU’s reason for lifting these sanctions was that they “had served their purpose.”

"Ad-hoc working group" on EU vaccine passport works in secret!

A new 'Ad hoc Working Party on the proposals for a Digital Green Certificate' has been set up to discuss two recent proposals. Despite the importance of the proposals, there may be even less opportunity than usual for the public to know what their governments are discussing in the Council.

Asked whether the ad-hoc working group would be keeping minutes of its meetings, the Council's press office told Statewatch:

Read more here

New platform provides transparency on EU security spending

A new platform that tracks spending by the EU on security-related projects and policies aims to serve as “a tool for journalists, researchers, civil society organizations and others to better understand the growing investments of the EU in security.

Read more here

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Calamity von der Leyen

Brexit was done and dusted. The deliberate hurdles set by Brussels to scupper Britain’s departure from the EU had been circumvented. The EU’s threats of custom posts on the island of Ireland, however unnecessary, were sorted by a “border” in the Irish Sea.

Johnson had got Brexit and Unionism would just have to grin and bear the new custom arrangements. It was out of sight and therefore out of mind, so there was no obvious loss of face for the representatives of the Union Jack “fleg” wavers. As for its paramilitary wings they could get on with the day-to-day business of drug dealing and criminality.

Read more here The EU-Israel Association Agreement

Entering into force in 2000, the EU-Israel Association Agreement is the main treaty governing relations between the EU and Israel. The Association Agreement facilitates largely unrestricted trade between the EU and Israel and allows Israel to participate in more EU programs and projects than any other non-European country.

As part of the Association Agreement, the EU-Israel Action plan sets out Israel’s participation in a wide variety of EU programs including the Horizon 2020 research funding program, the satellite navigation project Galileo and the Erasmus academic exchange program.

Read more here

EU Commission wants to eavesdrop on 5G connections

The EU Commission has announced new efforts to break end- to-end encrypted communications. This is what it says in the work program of the research framework program “Horizon 2020”, which proposes numerous new projects in the area of “Civil Security for Society” for the next two years. The commission wants to spend five million euros on a platform to penetrate encrypted connections.

The focus is on eavesdropping on the fifth generation of mobile communications, which makes encrypted and anonymised telephony technically possible. The project in the research line “Combating Crime and Terrorism” therefore bears the title “Legitimate wiretapping with new and emerging technologies (5G and beyond, quantum computing and encryption)”.

Read more here

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Frontex - The EU Parliament tries to keep the public in the dark as scandals rumble on!

Over a dozen MEPs cross-examined the agency's executive director, Fabrice Leggeri, last month but the meeting was to have been held behind closed doors, a decision made by European Parliament vice-president Roberta Metsola and the secretariat. Metsola is a Maltese MEP, leading the probe known as the Frontex Scrutiny Working Group. The group's mandate notes its twice-a-month meetings "should be public to the extent possible", in an effort to assess Frontex compliance with fundamental rights. Subsequently, MEPs succeeded in making the proceedings public.

Read more here Arming the EU combat drone

The EU drone, also referred to as the "European MALE RPAS", an acronym for Medium Altitude Long Endurance Remotely Piloted Aerial System is to be developed under German leadership by Airbus, Dassault (FRA), Leonardo (ITA) and Airbus SAU (SPAIN). Overall, the purchase is of 21 systems of 3 drones yet firmly promised. Currently, Germany intends to acquire seven systems, Italy and Spain five and France four.

Other governments are also considering buying the 'Euro drone' in larger numbers. Belgium, Finland, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal and Hungary looking at the possibility and don’t be surprised if Varadkar wants a few to accompany his troop carrier!

Read more here

The EU Commission cuts Ireland’s Recovery Fund allocation.

The EU Commission is planning to slash Ireland's share of its Covid-19 recovery fund by around €350 million on the back of better than expected GDP figures driven mainly by multinational export of pharmaceuticals. New documents reveal that the country’s allocation of €420m for 2023 has been cut down to just €68m.

This is occurring despite the domestic economy contracting by 5.4% - once again showing the fallacy of utilising GDP as a primary indicator of economic performance. Distribution, transport, hotels and restaurants sector contracted by 16.7 per cent, and construction also fell, down by a hefty 12.7 per cent. The arts and entertainment sector suffered one of the most severe hits, contracting by 54.4 per cent. Page | 6

More powers for Europol: what do Member State governments think?

Proposals published in December could vastly increase the powers of EU policing agency Europol, in particular by granting it new data-processing powers, a role in developing algorithms and new technologies for the police, and by easing cooperation with non-EU states. EU member states have been discussing the proposals since January. To facilitate democratic engagement and scrutiny, Statewatch has published internal Council documents that set out the member states' comments on the proposals so far.

Read more here

Austria reaffirms its veto of the Mercosur deal

Austria has reaffirmed its veto of the trade agreement between the EU and Mercosur, and asked Portugal, which holds the EU Presidency, to avoid any “possible attempt” to ratify the deal in its current form.

Vice Chancellor Werner Kogler warned that Austria will oppose any approval through the back door, either through an additional non- binding protocol or by dividing the agreement to facilitate entry into force of its commercial part. He also called for a transparent debate on Mercosur with maximum public participation. Read here about how Mercosur would put paid to EU climate ambitions.

For the agreement to enter into force it must be approved by the 27 EU Member States, as well as by the European Parliament. In a largely symbolic gesture, in July 2019, the Dáil rejected the Mercosur deal. Avoid a referendum at all costs!

A group of twelve EU member states including Ireland have joined forces to water down the outcome of the EU’s Conference on the Future of Europe. In a position paper, distributed in the General Affairs Council in late March, the governments of Austria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, the Netherlands, Slovakia, and Sweden set out a list of common interests for the 12-month event.

These include topics such as the rule of law, the digital transition, the recovery from the pandemic, climate policies and migration challenges - all also part of the strategic agenda of the European Council. However, reform of the existing legislative process and inter-institutional division of competences should be off the table for this group of countries, who argue that the conference "should not create legal obligations".

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The position paper explicitly excludes the possibility of treaty changes, arguing that "the Union framework offers potential to allow priorities to be addressed in an effective manner". So now, you can guess why the Irish government signed up with the ‘frugals!’

Why is the EU’s house bank still hiding over one-third of its lending? The European Investment Bank (EIB) whose shareholders are the EU member states uses various intermediaries – commercial banks, state development banks and private equity funds – to help reach smaller clients than it could otherwise attract. Such lending has doubled in the last 15 years, in 2019 accounting for about a third of the Bank’s EU operations. In 2020, the EIB Group provided more than EUR 30 billion for small and medium enterprises alone, which does not even cover the full range of intermediary lending. Despite years of requests from civil society, the public still has almost no idea what happens to this money.

Read more here

‘Father of the Euro’ dies

Canadian economist Robert Mundell considered by many to be a father of the Euro – and of Reaganomics - has died. The New York Times has an obituary. “Bob was a Nobel laureate whose work on optimum currency areas formed a crucial part of the intellectual foundations of the monetary union in the EU,” wrote ECB chief Christine Lagarde in her tribute on Twitter. Ambassador-designate of Canada to the EU Ailish Campbell wrote: “Sad to hear we have lost Robert Mundell, a fine Canadian economist and policy mind whose work was put into practice in the creation of the Euro and the European Monetary Union.”

The Palestinian election.

Israel has so far failed to respond to the European Union’s request to monitor the first Palestinian elections in 15 years, significantly reducing the chances of ensuring an adequate observer presence.

Palestinians go to the polls for legislative elections on 22 May, followed by a presidential election on 31 July. Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas said elections would be held as part of a warming of ties between his Fatah party and its Islamist rival Hamas. The Palestinian authority requested the EU to observe the vote, and one of the Page | 8 prerequisites would be to deploy an exploratory mission to assess the situation several months before the elections. And still, Israel receives exceptionally favourable treatment from the EU.

The EU "strategic compass"

The twenty - seven leaders of the EU want to sign off on a new shared defence strategy early next year, part of a push to improve military cooperation, Council President Charles Michel said. "We want to increase defence investment, and we want to enhance civilian and military capabilities and operational readiness," Michel said following the last Council meeting.

The overarching aim is greater strategic autonomy, allowing Europe to project its interests and values on a world stage where the United States seems to be pulling back while China and Russia are portrayed as an increasing threat.

The 27 countries have therefore been working on a new "strategic compass" formulating threats and projected ways of handling them. No doubt, there will be ample justification for increased military spending and closer military integration.

Michel said the document should be finished by March 2022.

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