Monthly Archives: July 2020

Poland should not withdraw from the Istanbul Convention, an international treaty that aims to stop violence against women, the head of human rights body the Council of Europe has said in response to announcements by officials in Warsaw.

Marija Pejčinović Burić said in a statement on Sunday that “announcements by government officials that Poland should withdraw from the Istanbul Convention are alarming.”

She added that “the Istanbul Convention is the Council of Europe‘s key international treaty to combat violence against women and domestic violence – and that is its sole objective.”

“If there are any misconceptions or misunderstandings about the Convention, we are ready to clarify them in a constructive dialogue,” Pejčinović Burić, who is secretary-general of the Council of Europe, said.

“Leaving the Istanbul Convention would be highly regrettable and a major step backwards in the protection of women against violence in Europe,” she also said.

Pejčinović Burić made her statement after Poland’s Justice Minister Zbigniew Ziobro announced a day earlier that the country was set to take steps to leave the European domestic violence treaty, state news agency PAP reported.

Ziobro told reporters on Saturday that the document contained “ideological provisions” that Poland’s ruling conservatives “do not accept and consider harmful.”

He added that Poland’s own legal system, reshaped by the country’s ruling conservatives in recent years, provided sufficient protection for women.

The Council of Europe is a 47-nation international organisation that aims to promote human rights, democracy and the rule of law.

(27. 7. 2020 via thenews.pl)

Financially, the southern EU states, and politically, the Central European countries have achieved success at the recently concluded EU summit, former Fidesz MEP and EU Commissioner Tibor Navracsics said in an interview with InfoRádió on Tuesday.

“Few people, including me, would have thought that the current European Council would reach a decision on two extremely important issues, since both the sum and structure of the 7-year financial framework were disputed, not to mention the economic recovery package, which was under complete attack,” former Commissioner Tibor Navracsics said.

Navracsics considers the fact that an agreement was reached on both financial issues to be the most important outcome of the negotiations and it clearly shows that “everyone found the compromise to be acceptable.”

According to the politician, the majority now sees the scale of the funds to be acceptable, only the Frugal Five are uncertain of it, which is why they wanted to pull an emergency brake on the fund disbursement order against those who might not use the money properly.

Navracsics thinks that today’s Europe is much more fragmented than it used to be. There is a left-leaning majority in the EP, so financial debates can very easily drift into ideological disputes in the future, he said.

With the agreement, southern EU countries have escaped the threat of bankruptcy, thus they can be considered the greatest winners of the agreement financially but not politically, Navracsics emphasized.

It is the Central European region that achieved the most politically.

Hungary and Poland have fought out a good position by hinting for a veto in case the EU ties the rightfully due payouts to the rule of law criteria, Navracsics emphasized.

The former Commissioner considers the removal of the political conditions from the agreement and the additional 3 billion Euro subsidy included in the final deal a huge success for Hungary.

He is hopeful that the quick completion of the Article 7 proceedings promised by Germany against Hungary is not just a political gesture, but much more.

“The procedure was a process that was difficult to grasp and define from the beginning; it was initiated by the EP, the EC was only half-hearted about it, and did not believe that the procedure would lead to any results,” Navracsics explained.

The politician believes that the EU summit was an important step in the direction of the “emancipation” of Central Europe along Polish and Hungarian values ??and interests.

He does not think that Western European states are looking down on Central and Eastern European ones, but rather perceives a mutual misunderstanding- the East sees the West to be too soft and pliable, while the West thinks the East is too combative and uncouth.

(22. 7. 2020 via hungarytoday.hu)

After marathon talks, EU member states have agreed to a historic coronavirus recovery deal. Disagreements concerning access to the aid package had turned the negotiations into one of the bloc’s longest-ever summits.

EU leaders agreed early Tuesday to an unprecedented €1.8 trillion ($2 trillion) aid and budget deal aimed at helping hard-hit bloc members recover from the economic fallout of the novel coronavirus pandemic.

The package includes a €750-billion fund to be sent as loans and grants, as well as a seven-year €1 trillion EU budget.

European Council President Charles Michel tweeted a brief message minutes after leaders adopted the plan: “Deal!”

“We did it. Europe is strong, Europe is united. This is a good deal, this is a strong deal and most importantly this is the right deal for Europe right now,” Michel said. “I believe this agreement will be seen as a pivotal moment for Europe’s journey.”

The breakthrough comes after more than four days of wrangling, with talks often stretching into the early hours.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen thanked German Chancellor Angela Merkel for “steering” negotiations towards a European solution.

“Europe as a whole has now a big change to come out stronger from the crisis. Today we have taken a historic step that we can all be proud of,” said von der Leyen. “Tonight is a big step toward recovery.”

Merkel described the agreement as an “important signal,” and said she was “very relieved” that EU leaders were able to cooperate. It was good “that we pulled ourselves together in the end,” she said.

That sentiment was echoed by French President Emmanuel Macron, who called it a “historic day for Europe.”

“There is no such thing as a perfect world, but we have made progress,” said Macron.

However, the European Parliament will still have to agree to the package.

Terms of the package

The package includes the biggest-ever joint borrowing by the 27 members of the bloc, and an initiative to send tens of billions of euros to countries hardest hit by the virus — most notably heavily indebted Spain and Italy, which had both called for major financial assistance from the EU.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez hailed “a Marshall Plan for Europe,” that would see €140 billion sent to Spain over the next six years.

Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said that Italy was “satisfied” with the results of the plan, which would see 28% of the total funds, or €209 billion directed towards Italy. That figure includes €81 billion in grants and €127 billion in loans.

“We are satisfied with the approval of an ambitious relaunch plan, which will allow us to confront the crisis with strength and effectiveness,” said Conte.

Greece will also receive €72 billion under the plan, in a move that Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis caled a “national success.”

He said the funds would be disbursed carefully in Greece with meticulous planning.

“We have no intention of spreading the money around with the carefree attitude of the nouveau-riche,” Mitsotakis said. “We have no intention of wasting this significant European capital now at our disposal. We will invest it to the benefit of all Greeks.”

To meet the concerns fo the so-called frugal four — the Netherlands, Austria, Denmark and Sweden — which see Italy and Spain as being too lax with public spending, the assistance includes a number of conditions and major strings attached. The southern countries had previously called for conditionless financial assistance, without additional obligations.

The frugals also won heavy rebates on their EU contributions. The deal additionally allows for the distribution of €360 billion in loans, repayable by the receiving member state, and €390 billion in the form of grants to pandemic-hit countries — a lower figure than the initial €500-billion grant proposal made by France and Germany.

Days of haggling

Negotiations were bogged down by major disagreements concerning grants, loans and whether economic and financial reforms should dictate access to the funds. The 27 member states had been largely divided into two camps. Germany and France spearheaded efforts to collectivize debt in order to raise much-needed funds for countries such as Italy and Spain, which bore the brunt of the pandemic in the EU.

In the other camp, the frugal four, together with Finland had called for a strings-attached approach that would have made access to funds conditional on tough market reforms.

That camp also support stringent measures that would have blocked funding for countries that did not adhere to EU rules on the rule of law. That could have jeopardized funding for countries such as Hungary and Poland who are the target of a European Commission investigation over rule of law violations.

EU nations have struggled to coordinate a response to the coronavirus pandemic, which has claimed some 135,000 lives on the continent. The bloc’s economy is projected to contract by 8.3% this year.

(21. 7. 2020 via dw.com)

Poland’s government is likely to undergo a reshuffle after the summer vacations, the country’s conservative leader has said.

In an interview with public broadcaster Polish Radio, Jarosław Kaczyński said: “I believe this will happen directly after the holidays.”

He added that “there will certainly be personnel changes,” but, despite media speculation, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki would keep his job as head of government.

“The prime minister will stay on, but the government will be restructured so as to eliminate a situation in which some decisions have to go through several different ministries,” Kaczyński told Polish Radio on Sunday.

He indicated that the bottom line was to make the decision-making process within the government less “dispersed” and more efficient.

Kaczyński, who heads Poland’s ruling conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party, did not name any Cabinet ministers who could be replaced.

Kaczyński’s party last fall secured a second term in power, together with two smaller right-wing groupings, in the wake of parliamentary elections.

Meanwhile, the country’s conservative President Andrzej Duda, an ally of the government, this month won a runoff vote and was re-elected for another five years as head of state.

(20. 7. 2020 via thenews.pl)

Thousands of anti-government protesters in Bulgaria — some chanting “Mafia out” — have hit the streets of the capital Sofia.

They allege endemic corruption and want the resignation of PM Boyko Borissov, his centre-right government and the chief prosecutor.

So, what’s the story behind the protests? And, can Borissov successfully calm the storm engulfing his administration?

What’s the background to Bulgaria’s anti-government protests?
July 7: Heavily armed security officers raided the offices of President Rumen Radev, a vocal critic of the conservative ruling party’s record on corruption. Radev accuses Borissov of having “links with the oligarchs”.

The president’s legal affairs and anti-corruption secretary and his security and defence advisor were detained for questioning and their offices searched.

Critics say the raid and arrests, organised by Chief Prosecutor Ivan Geshev, raise questions over whether his role has become too political.

“Corruption and the justice deficit is a terminal issue,” Dimitar Bechev, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, told Euronews.

“But now it resonates with a wider swathe of society as Prime Minister Borissov looks weak and dependent on vested interests and Ivanov’s actions exposed vividly how graft is victimising each and every Bulgarian,” he said.

Prosecutors said the raids were part of two separate investigations into influence-peddling and disclosure of state secrets.

Protesters, who chanted “Mafia out” and “Resign” on Saturday accuse Borissov’s government and chief prosecutor Geshev of deliberately delaying investigations into alleged links between officials and local oligarchs.

July 11: Radev called on the government and the chief prosecutor to resign.

“Turning the government into a mafia-type structure has pushed freedom-loving Bulgarians of all ages, regardless of their political affiliations, to raise demands for respect of the law,” he said in a televised address to the country.

“There is only one way out of the current situation — the resignation of the government and the prosecutor general.”

He said anger had risen after years of “corruption, incitement of fear, prosecution racketeering” and that an “anti-mafia consensus” was forming.

Civil protests begin hours later with demonstrators demanding the ruling GERB party and chief prosecutor resign.

July 12: Protests turn violent. 18 demonstrators are arrested, two protesters and four police officers injured.

July 13: Protesters now demand an end to what they say is police brutality as well as for the government’s resignation.

Hundreds of demonstrators take to a small beach on the Black Sea to protest against high-ranking officials they believe broke the law.

Access to the beach is cut as it is an estate used by the leader of a small liberal party that quietly backs Borissov, reports AFP news agency.

Protests continue the following days in the capital Sofia and in some other cities in Bulgaria. Government protesters also try to break into parliament.

Is Bulgaria corrupt?
Governance watchdog Transparency International ranks Bulgaria as the most corrupt of the 27 nations in the EU.

“The sense of a lack of justice accumulated through all those instances in the last month or so,” said Vessela Tcherneva, head of the Sofia office of the European Council on Foreign Relations think tank.

“People got very enraged because they’re now convinced the oligarchy has much more power over the state than anyone can imagine and that the prosecutor general acts as a politician rather than a public defender,” she told Euronews.

But it is not just at a political level. Corruption affects Bulgaria’s businesses too. The economy is said to be one of the poorest in Europe, mainly due to corruption.

A 2019 report from the Centre for the Study of Democracy in Sofia on corruption in Bulgaria said that at least 35% of public procurement contracts involve corrupt practices.

How has the Borissov reacted to calls for him to resign?
Prime Minister Borissov, a former bodyguard and fireman, said when the protests started he would stay in power citing a need for stability as “the world enters into its most horrible crisis”, referring to the coronavirus pandemic.

He has repeatedly urged for calm and refused to stand down.

On July 15, Borissov’s party announced in a statement that the prime minister had asked for the resignation of the finance, economy and interior ministers after talks within the party.

The news was initially applauded by thousands of protesters but, a day later, more than 18,000 people were back on the streets calling for Borissov’s resignation.

“Judging by the level of rage you can see on the streets, a lot of young people won’t take cosmetic measures as an answer,” said Tcherneva, adding that the firing of the ministers will probably not be enough to quell the unrest.

“We may also have reached the point of no return in the sense that only holding new elections can resolve the crisis,” she said.

Who are Bulgaria’s anti-government protesters?
The demonstrators are mainly students, artists and young professionals, said Tcherneva.

She said the rallies are mainly peaceful and that the “general motive is extremely civic”.

“Even yesterday [Thursday] we saw people from the demonstrations standing between police and protesters to avoid any tension or provocation,” she said.

As the number of protesters is between 10,000-20,000 people, she said the movement is “not threatening to stability or public order”.

Euronews has interviewed Maria Mateva, a 32-year-old activist at ?????????? ?? ????? (Justice for All) who joined the protest from day one, initially in her hometown of Burgas, then in Sofia.

According to Ms Mateva – who wants a comprehensive reform of the justice system, including changes to the chief prosecutor’s role – no mainstream party is fit to drive real change in Bulgaria.

“Look, most political formations in Bulgaria descent from the Communist party structure, they are the same people coloured differently”.

She hopes that smaller parties, like Democratic Bulgaria (DB), supported by the “true democrats”, she says, will grow bigger in the future. (DB currently holds no seats in parliament).

However, she thinks it will be the young people that will have the power to turn the tide, a generation that “studied and lived abroad” and that will “hopefully get rid” of the current political class, something the previous generations failed to achieve.

“My cousin just called me on the phone from Dublin crying ‘I had to be with you, my generation is stupid and failed, but you will succeed'”.

Katrina Dimitrova, a young Bulgarian who studied in the UK and lives in London, is part of the generation Maria Mateva referred to, and agrees with her: “We need a fresh start, new faces”.

What’s the solution to Bulgaria’s protests?
The solution for rooting out corruption in Bulgaria lies in new elections, said Bechev, adding it would have to be followed by “root-and-branch judiciary reform”, which would include “curbing the prosecutor general’s power and expanding accountability”.

But that appears unlikely. Borissov’s current term in office is due to end in early 2021 and he has refused to step down before then.

He is due to face a no-confidence motion launched by the Socialist party next week, which he is expected to win.

(18. 7. 2020 via euronews.com)