The Brief – A more French EU around the corner?

Editorialists can sometimes feel bad if they read columns they wrote a couple of years ago or even a couple of months ago. I start today’s Brief with this disclaimer.

We all make mistakes. We collectively thought Angela Merkel was the best leader the EU could have, and we regretted her departure.

Now, after she acted as if she was Vladimir Putin’s asset, including by spearheading Germany’s addiction to Russian gas, the best that could be said about her is that she is doing everyone a favour by taking her retirement seriously.

Many people in Brussels think Ursula von der Leyen will win another mandate as Commission chief. Many believe, and I agree, that she has shown wondrous leadership in the context of Russia’s brutal aggression against Ukraine.

But is this enough?

To get the top job, one needs the support of a qualified majority of EU heads of state and government and a majority vote in the European parliament, in which she will need 361 votes in favour by secret vote.

Maths aside, in practice, without the support of France, any candidate will fail.

In 2019, von der Leyen was a surprise proposal by Emmanuel Macron. Viktor Orbán voted against it, but that wasn’t an obstacle. In the European Parliament, the vote was tight, and she passed, thanks to the votes of the outgoing pro-EU British MEPs.

This time, evidence suggests that Macron will not be backing her for another mandate.

First, it was the highly unusual post on X by Thierry Breton, the flamboyant French commissioner for the internal market.

“The real question now:  Is it possible to (re)entrust the management of Europe to the EPP for five more years, or 25 years in a row? The EPP itself does not seem to believe in its candidate”.

The Commission spokesperson sought to de-dramatise this by saying this was a “personal opinion”.

But maybe it was Macron’s opinion.

At the last EU summit, Macron made one little-noticed but important comment at the final presser.

“The presidency of the Commission has a vocation to defend the general interest, so it must not be over-politicised. Which, it must be recognised, was not at all the case for the outgoing Commission.”

In the context of Russia’s aggression against Ukraine and the risk of its spillover, and taking into account the likely scenario that Donald Trump would stop precious US aid to Kyiv, Macron is assuming his responsibilities.

From dove to hawk, he did a U-turn on his previous statements of the “Europe should not humiliate Putin” type and shocked many recently by “not ruling out” the option of sending boots on the ground in Ukraine.

Macron is the only EU leader with the potential to provide leadership if the US dishonours itself under the navel-gazing motto “Let’s make America great again”.

And he has many instruments: the nuclear deterrent, the permanent Security Council seat, and a constitution which gives him enormous powers to decide.

And he could have one more instrument.

Would Macron fail to ensure that the new European Commission is with him through thick and thin? Would he take any risk?

I don’t think so.

I think Macron will ensure that the Commission is a faithful ally in times of trouble. Which could mean a French Commission president. It could be Thierry Breton, it could be Bruno Le Maire. In any case, it would be a strong personal ally.

If Germany is serious about preserving the chance to keep the spluttering Franco-German engine running, it should be the first to back Macron. But Germany is not in good shape under Chancellor Olaf Scholz.

Any country has its ups and downs and Berlin – currently weakened and meandering – needs to admit that Paris should lead the way.

It may also turn out that von der Leyen will have her way – and then… I will eat my hat.

The Roundup

A tight race for third place in the European Parliament elections continues with the liberal Renew Europe group recovering the lead over far-right ID and nationalist-conservative ECR group, according to Europe Elect’s latest projection for Euractiv.

France should continue refusing to include renewable targets in its energy-climate plan, which will be submitted to the European Commission in June, the country’s former energy minister Agnès Pannier-Runacher said this week.

Despite deteriorating political relations between Armenia and Russia, bilateral trade has flourished, leaving Western partners wondering about Yerevan’s approach to sanctions.

A senior European Union official denied that the bloc’s recently agreed-upon plan to diversify its supply of strategically critical raw materials targets China, a move that could be seen as trying to ease increasingly fraught relations between Beijing and Brussels.

Belarus faced the first EU sanctions almost 30 years ago, however, it seems this was not enough for all the involved parties to build an effective information policy regarding the sanctions.

To stay on top of EU politics ahead of the European elections, check out this week’s EU Elections Decoded.

Look out for…

• Commissioner Iliana Ivanova in China Friday-Sunday; Japan Monday-Wednesday.

Views are the author’s

[Edited by Zoran Radosavljevic/Alice Taylor]