By Caroline Linton

The gloves are off in the run-up to this week’s European Parliament election. 

The Party of European Socialists (PES) has published a list of 11 rival candidates it describes as terrible and invites readers to complete the list by adding a 12th candidate of his or her choice. The PES’ centre-right rivals, the European People’s Party (EPP), has hit back by calling it ”cheap populism”.

The list is headed by Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and includes Jaime Mayor Oreja, a Spanish member of the European Parliament, and British National Party candidate Nick Griffin. Griffin, Igor Gräzin of the Estonia Reform Party and Derk-Jan Eppink of the Belgian Lijst Dedecker are the only three representing groups that are not part of the EPP.

PES officials said the candidates on the list would not contribute anything positive to parliament. In the case of Berlusconi, the PES’ complaint is that he has no intention of sitting in any of Italy’s five electoral regions. It said sed Oreja had not spoken in the parliament since November 2007 and had failed to condemn the authoritarian rule of General Francisco Franco, who ruled Spain from 1936 until 1975. 

It rejected statements by Eppink about what he called the the difficulty of being “a white, heterosexual Dutchman with a good job and an expensive car” in the Belgian region of Flanders. It criticised Brice Hortefeux, France’s social affairs and employment minister, for saying illegal immigrants were neither “honest” nor “clean”. Griffin has been condemned for denying the Holocaust.

EPP President Wilfried Martens issued a statement condemning the publication of the list and said it was a new low for the PES leadership.

“To call a number of distinguished EPP candidates ‘terrible’ as the PES did today or calling our millions of supporters across Europe ‘barbarians’ as the President of the Socialist International did last week, is truly regrettable,” Martens said. “I am convinced that the European citizens will punish the populism of the Socialists at the polls.”

The PES also suggested the EPP was such a broad alliance that voters who back a party in their home country could be backing a party in another country with policies and candidates he or she did not approve of.

Even so, the PES brings together various ideologies as well, with members ranging from the British Labour Party to the Social Democratic Party in Germany.

    French President Nicolas Sarkozy opens a jack-in-the-box  decorated with the EU flag, a boxing glove springs out and  knocks out the teeth of Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan .

     “No more empty promises to Turkey,” a snickering Sarkozy  says.  The cartoon in daily Milliyet darkly panders to what most  Turks feel these days are the European Union’s true intentions  towards Turkey’s EU quest — no matter how many obstacles thrown  at its wheels Turkey surmounts on the long and winding road to  Brussels, it will ultimately be denied entry at the gates of the  promised land .

    A survey last weekend by Bahcesehir University in Istanbul  showed that 80 percent of Turks believe that even if Ankara  meets all political and economic requirements for EU accession,  the EU will still not accept it as a member.

    The study was published ahead of the June 4-7 European  Parliament vote, in which Turkey’s bid to join the EU has become  an election issue in some EU countries to the chagrin of the  Turks, always sensitive about their self-image in the West .

     Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel and Sarkozy of France  have used the campaign trail to reiterate their opposition to  Turkey’s full EU membership, saying Ankara instead should be  given a “privileged partnership”; Sweden’s Foreign Minister Carl  Bildt and his British counterpart David Miliband joined voices  to stress the “strategic interest” of accepting Turkey into the  bloc .

     Election issues can be notoriously short-sighted, but at the  heart of the debate is the very idea of Europe and where it  should draw its borders as it strives to tackle new challenges  such as globalisation, climate change, nuclear proliferation,  energy dependency, the rise of China and other powers or  security .

     Is Turkey — a predominantly Muslim country of 72 million  people with a per capita income of only one-third that of the  27-nation bloc — too poor and too culturally different to fit  into the EU? Do “Little Europeans” from Paris to Berlin, aghast at the  prospect of a EU bordering Iran, Iraq and Syria really want a  fortress and “Christians-only” Europe? Can Europe afford losing Turkey?

     Enlargement-fatigue and a Lisbon Treaty in intensive care  have narrowed politicians’ sights, but the wider question over  the future of Europe will not go away.

     Ankara’s lack of progress in key areas such as clipping the  power of the military and expanding freedom of expression since  accession negotiations began in 2005 has consumed much of the  debate of late. But again, what are four years in a country  which has changed beyond recognition since the 1980s by throwing  open its markets to foreign investors, shattering long-held  taboos and democratically electing former Islamists as president  and prime minister without witnessing a military coup?

     Those who back Ankara’s full membership say Turkey has  enormous benefits for the bloc — it is a secular democracy with  a vibrant market economy, NATO’s second-largest army, a  strategically positioned energy hub between the West and the  East, and a rising regional power with bridges to the Muslim  world .

     Those against it shudder at its sheer size — by 2050  Turkey’s fast growing population will reach 100 million –, are  troubled by its authoritarian ways, awed by its Islamic identity  and horrified at its treatment of minorities and news of honour  killings that feed the view of the “barbarian Turk” .

     Turks insist that joining Europe is the culmination of  founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk’s drive to modernise the country and say Europe without a city like Istanbul will never fully be Europe.

     Brussels says banning Youtube, prosecuting Nobel laureate  writer Orhan Pamuk for “insulting the Turkish nation” and  meddlesome generals are incompatible with European values of  tolerance, freedom and rule of law .

     In any case, if Turkey is to join Europe — there are more  than 80,000 pages of European laws and regulations before that  happens — it would take decades rather than years. By then both  Europe and Turkey will be quite different from what they are  today. Sarkozy and Merkel will be long gone from the stage .

     History of course carries its weight. After all, Ottoman  Turks stormed twice as conquerors into Europe, hammering at the  very gates of Vienna, and European powers occupied large parts  of today’s Turkey after the collapse of the empire .

     The survey by Bahcesehir University also highlighted Turkey’s own ambivalence toward Europe — aspiring to be a part  of it but harbouring dark suspicions towards it as well .

     Three out of four Turks believe the EU is trying to dismember Turkey and 81 percent believe the bloc’s goal is to spread Christianity. However, 57 percent said they wanted full  EU membership for Turkey .

     But again, can Turkey afford to lose Europe?  

By Tamora Vidaillet and Darren Ennis

Reporters at a long-awaited summit between the European Union and China in Prague Castle learnt more about the art of stage managing set-piece events than about the state of the EU-China relationship.

The Czech Republic, which holds the EU presidency until the end of next month, pulled out all the stops to ensure security was tight for Wednesday’s fleeting visit by Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and a handful of ministers, who were kept away from journalists by barriers.

Ushered into a stuffy holding room hours before the meeting, journalists were kept from stepping outside even for a smoke for fear of escaping into the sprawling compound of the castle.

Outside, other aspects of the summit were subjected to similar controls. About 60 peope protesting against alleged Chinese abuses of human rights were kept well away from the eyes of Wen, who swept into the castle in a motorcade of black limousines.

Instead of letting Wen arrive to a chorus of abuse, Chinese men in suits carefully orchestrated a more friendly crowd of local Chinese well-wishers who merrily waved Czech and Chinese flags as Wen and his entourage drove by.

Once Wen’s car was safely within the sealed confines of the castle, the men handed out McDonald’s hamburgers to thank the crowd, which held up two banners in Chinese declaring their love for the premier.

Back in the castle, journalists from as far afield as Japan, Brussels, London and Paris waited impatiently before finally getting permission to go to what had been hailed as a news conference.

What an anti-climax. Rumours that plans to have a question-and-answer session would be scuppered proved true. Czech President Vaclav Klaus started a series of scripted statements. European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso signalled for Wen to go next, but Wen made it clear he wanted the final word after what he described as 20 hours of flying time to visit Prague for just a few hours.

After his long statement, there was no time left for questions — on issues such as human rights or currencies — leaving journalists wondering why they had bothered to travel all this way.

Aides acknowledged it was more of a ceremonial, set-piece event than a meeting of substance.

Members of the European Parliament engaged in some mutual back-slapping at their final session this week before an election next month.

“Nowadays very few decisions are taken in the European Union without the express consent and participation of the European Parliament,” said the parliament’s president, Hans-Gert Poettering. 

“Increasingly, the European Parliament has become the fulcrum of political compromise at European level,” he said, reeling off a long list of laws passed in the assembly’s five-year term. 

Graham Watson, leader of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats in the chamber, hailed Poettering’s work: ”Today, I think that I can speak for many when I say that you have earned our respect and affection.”

They are fine-sounding words – but few of the 375 million people who are eligible to vote in the June 4-7 election to a new parliament are likely to have heard them. And few are likely to care.

Opinion polls suggest the turnout will be low, with only about one in three respondents planning to vote. They also suggest European citizens know little about what the parliament does, even though it is responsible for passing pan-European laws that can have a direct impact on their lives.

This apathy could open the way for non-mainstream parties.    

One of these is the Libertas party, a pan-European group which opposes the Lisbon treaty intended to reform the EU’s institutions to make decision-making easier and give the EU more clout on the world stage.

Another is the UK Independence Party which wants to pull Britain out of the EU.  Its leader, Nigel Farage, sounded a dissonant note on Wednesday when he accused it of being undemocratic in a speech from the floor of the assembly in the French city of Strasbourg.

He said the parliament had “bulldozed” aside the wishes of Dutch and French voters who rejected the EU’s draft constitution in 2005 and the desires of Irish voters who said ‘no’ last year to the Lisbon reform treaty that is meant to replace it.

“This parliament has wilfully carried on ignoring the wishes of the people. You just don’t get it do you? ‘No’ means ‘no’,” Farage told the assembly. 

The parliament appears to have a long way to go to convince voters it is relevant to their daily lives.

Little wonder, then, that Poettering urged members of the assembly to go out and explain to voters why the parliament is significant. 

“The next five years will see hugely important decisions face this Parliament. If you care what decisions it takes, and you care who is taking them, then make your voice heard,” Poettering said in a recent message to voters.

Judging by the opinion polls, the members of parliament will have a hard time winning voters over. And they have barely a month to do so.

A pink dragon-like alien from outerspace (who for some odd reason is called “Blue”) is driving through space one day when he gets into a traffic accident with some space debris and falls to earth. The creature lands in Southeast Asia (where bizarre traffic accidents are commonplace) in a place called “ASEAN Village”. It is here, waiting for his spaceship to be fixed, where Blue learns about ASEAN and its acheivements over the past 40 years, and its aspiration to become one big happy ASEAN Community.

Environmental activists dressed in orangutan suits at the ASEAN summit in Hua Hin, Thailand, Feb. 28, 2009. REUTERS PHOTO/Adrees Latif

This is the storyline from a new comic book and animated cartoon for schoolchildren that the ASEAN Secretariat has commissioned to propagate the idea of an ASEAN Community, one not so unlike the European Community, which the leaders of today are hoping to bequeath the children of tomorrow. And as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations gets set to host its annual pow-wow with other Asia-Pacific powers this weekend in Thailand, the story of a stranger in a strange land seems apt.

At the risk of being snide, observers can sometimes feel like they’ve dropped out of the sky and landed in a puzzling world where people speak in a profusion of arcane acronyms at ASEAN’s confabulations. (North Korea barked at ARF. AWGEE issued an impressive enviornmental paper. BIMP-EAGA went to CARD, connected the DOTS, and an agreement was nearly in their GRSP before they had to go back to the KRIBB for a ZOPFAN)

What is this ASEAN village anyway? The devil is truly in the details here. ASEAN is aiming to become an integrated political/security, economic and cultural community by 2015. But what does an integrated political community mean exactly in a grouping that includes Myanmar’s truculent junta, not to mention the communist states, kingdoms and boisterous democracies that comprise the rest of the ASEAN village?
If all that isn’t confusing enough, ASEAN is also intent on creating some sort of East Asian community with its dialogue partners in the “East Asia Summit” – Japan, China, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand and India — though it seems even more vague and ambivalent about that.

The idea had its genesis in the early 1990s, when Malaysia’s outspoken premier Mahathir Mohamad campaigned for a conclave of Asian tiger economies which he dubbed the East Asia Economic Caucus – pointedly exlcuding non-Asians from the clique. (Some wags called it the “caucus without the Caucasians”.) The United States, loathe to see China gain ascendancy in the region, pushed strenuously (working through Japan) to include its allies “Down Under” in the group.

A demonstrator walks past a picture depicting ousted Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra as a superhero during an anti-government protest outside Government House in Bangkok April 7, 2009. Supporters of Thaksin are holding big demonstrations to try to embarrass it an the annual East Asia summit this weekend that Thailand is hosting. REUTERS/Chaiwat Subprasom

I remember covering an ASEAN meeting in Brunei in 1995 when Australia’s then foreign minister Gareth Evans unrolled a huge map of East Asia which absurdly showed Siberia at the top, Antarctica at the bottom and the Australian continent smack dab in the middle. Malaysia’s foreign minister (and future prime minister) Abdullah Badawi was beside himself. He stormed up to the podium, pointed with a shaking finger at the map and declared: “Australia is not there, it’s down there,” gesturing vehemently at the floor.

So ASEAN wound up caucusing with the Caucasians in the end, launching this annual East Asia Summit four years ago, as an encore act to its annual meetings. And as in a Bertold Brecht play, they have been 16 leaders in search of an existential purpose ever since.

The first summit in Kuala Lumpur was almost an umitigated disaster. China and South Korea were barely on speaking terms with Japan because of its prime minister’s visit to the controversial Yakusuni war shine. At the second summit in Cebu Philippines, the voluble host, Philippine President Gloria Arroyo took a stab at defining the East Asia community, describing it as “many concentric cirlces” converging on areas of common ground such as trade. You could almost see the bubbles floating around.

This weekend’s meeting in Pattaya, Thailand will try to find common ground in dealing with the financial crisis, which has begun to pinch Asia’s largely export-dependent economies. The leaders will sign agreements on energy, climate change, food security. They will be filled with important sounding acronyms and they will be legally pretty much worthless.
If the leaders ever begin to talk seriously, say about a single currency or monetary union as Europe did a quarter-century or so ago, then they can truly start being a community. Or a village if they prefer. Until that happens, Dr. Mahathir had it right. This is a caucus without much focus.

A farmer pushes a bicycle as he walks along a paddy field in Ngai Cau village, 20 km (12.5 miles) outside Hanoi, April 4, 2008. The East Asia summit this weekend in Pattay, Thailland is expected to talk about a food security agreement. REUTERS/Kham

Few politicians so far are calling for protectionism.

Among economic and diplomatic policy-makers, openly advocating protectionism is about as socially acceptable as promoting child pornography.

So how to explain the slew of tariff hikes, export subsidies, non-tariff barriers, stimulus packages and bailouts — highlighted in a report at the World Trade Organisation – which all have the effect of slowing imports, boosting exports and generally promoting jobs at home at the expense of competitors?

The answer: they are not protectionist. Everybody says so.

New subsidies for French carmakers? Not a whiff of protectionism, says French Economy Minister Christine Lagarde. It’s all about research and development.

Export subsidies resumed for EU dairy produce? Not protectionism, says EU Trade Commissioner Catherine Ashton. It’s just a technical measure triggered by market prices.

“Buy American” in the U.S. stimulus package? Not protectionism, the Senate says. It will be “applied in a manner consistent with U.S. obligations under international agreements”.

Higher Indian steel tariffs? Not protectionism, says New Delhi. We cut them when inflation was high, and now that inflation was moderated we can put them back to their normal level.

Indonesian imports restricted to 5 ports of entry? Not protectionism, Jakarta says. It’s all about tackling smugglers.

Everybody’s doing it — denying that trade measures are protectionist.

With the naval might of the United States, Europe, China and others now lined up against Somalia's pirate fraternity, shippers are hoping the nightmare year of 2008 will not be repeated.
 
Somali pirates -- mainly gangs of poor young men seeking a quick fortune under the direction of older "financiers" and boat leaders --  reaped tens of millions of dollars in ransoms last year in a record haul of 42 hijacks, 111 attacks, and 815 crew taken hostage. 
 
That pushed insurance prices up, persuaded some ship-owners to go round South Africa instead of through the Suez Canal, and prompted the unprecedented rush of navies from 14 different nations to the region. Even China is in on the act, deploying its navy for the first time beyond its own waters. And Japan is considering following suit despite its post-World War II pacifist constitution.
 
There have been some early successes from all the deployments - half a dozen pirates arrested and a series of attacks blocked, by helicopter and boat. Bad weather, too, has given the pirates some real problems, drowning five of them when their pockets were stuffed with dollars after taking their share of the ransom from the release of a Saudi super-tanker.
 
Yet the pirates have still managed two new hijacks and 11 attacks in the first half of January. They are hanging on to 11 ships with 207 hostages - most notably a Ukrainian ship with tanks on board. 
 
And with such a vast area of operations -- plus fancy new speedboats that have taken them as far as Kenya and Madagascar, and GPS equipment to keep away from the warships -- the pirates are confident of keeping their business going. So who will win this modern-day battle of the seas? Will the shipping industry lose as much to the pirates this year as they did last? Should they keep paying huge ransoms like the $3 million paid for the Saudi boat?

Maybe, some argue, it will never really be possible to eradicate such a lucrative business which, in one of the world's most failed states, offers an opportunity for poor and hungry men to become millionaires after a few successful raids. As one pirate told us, they will carry on until there is government again in Somalia.

The difference between Europe having Russian gas as normal and not having it came down, in the end, to three words. They were hand-written next to what looks like the signature of Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister Hryhory Nemyrya and they were: “With declaration attached”.

That was enough to undercut a deal hammered out by Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek, whose country holds the rotating EU Presidency, to deploy monitors along the gas pipeline route — Russia’s condition for turning the taps back on.

The declaration that Nemyrya referred to set out Ukraine’s position in a dispute with Moscow over gas prices. It said, among other things, that Ukraine has no outstanding debts to Russia, an assertion with which Moscow strongly disagrees. Russia said the addition of the three words made the monitoring agreement null and void. Deal off.

Which was a shame, because the two sides came tantalisingly close to turning the gas back on.
A few hours earlier, a team of European Union monitors had arrived by bus at the Sudzha gas compressor station in western Russia. They were all set to supervise the resumption of gas flows. They even had a party of journalists in tow to witness the big moment.

In the event, the monitors ate some food, had a tour of the site, and then left for the nearby town of Kursk, presumably to find a hotel for the night. The journalists were loaded onto a bus and driven back to the Ukrainian border where they had come from. For the EU officials trying to get the gas turned back on, it was back to the drawing board. And for people in the worst affected countries in Europe, it meant more days worrying about an energy crisis in mid-winter. 

So whose fault was it? Maybe Topolanek should have stopped Nemyrya inserting those three little words. It’s worth asking if these problems would have arisen if the row happened two weeks earlier, when Nicolas Sarkozy still held the EU presidency on behalf of France. Maybe Ukraine should not have tried to amend the agreement by the back door. Maybe Russia should have held its nose and found a way to work around those three words if that was what it took to restore gas flows quickly. Whatever the answer, the episode makes one thing clear: there is total mistrust between the governments of Russia and Ukraine.

The deal could still be resurrected. Russian gas export monopoly Gazprom said early on Monday Ukraine had signed a new version of the agreement, without the conditions. A Russian delegation was on its way to Brussels, possibly to add their signatures to the new version. But even once the deal is done and the gas is flowing again to Europe, the row at the centre of all this, over how much Ukraine should pay for its gas, will still be there. And with so little trust between Moscow and Kiev, as illustrated by the saga of the three little words, that leaves vast potential for new flare-ups.

Hungary has negotiated a $25 billion economic rescue package with the IMF, the EU and the World Bank. What else is new? As that non-Hungarian philosopher of gamesmanship Yogi Berra put it, it’s ”like déjà vu all over again”.  

Consider the words of historian Paul Lendvai who wrote: ”Its economy in tatters, Hungary accepts a loan of 250 million gold crowns.” “Fiscal stability was restored, a currency reform was introduced…and after a modest upswing the value of industrial production stood 12 percent higher…”

The date? The 1920s. The lender: The League of Nations. Only the details have changed.

Hungary seems never to have encountered a global financial crisis it didn’t jump into head first.

If you want to see pictures of banknotes discarded on the street as trash (one is widely available on the Web) just dig in the archives for photos from post-World War Two Budapest.

Inflation in Zimbabwe has hit astounding heights of 230 million percent, but in 1946 prices in Hungary rose by more than 40 quadrillion percent a month.

Over the past century, Hungary has had three different currencies — the korona, the pengo and the forint, each introduced when the previous tanked.

The perky forint — the same currency that is in a bit of a pickle today — made its debut in 1946 at an exchange rate of one forint equal to 400 octillion pengo — a number that was essentially more than all the pengo then in circulation.

Hungarian inflation today of under 6 percent is not remotely in the ballpark of the 1940s and the chances of total collapse are slim to non existent.

Hungary is a member of the European Union and NATO and its economy is substantial. One of Hungary’s local banks, OTP, is a regional heavyweight. The Audi car plant in Gyor, western Hungary, churns out engines and the hot Audi TT sports car.

But there is cause for concern. Why has Hungary been hit harder than most, putting it in the company of  Pakistan, Ukraine and Belarus which have also been talking to the IMF.

Hungary’s external debt amounted to 89.9 billion euros, or 93.8 percent of gross domestic product (GDP), in the second quarter of 2008. This is not good at a time when banks are reluctant to lend to each other, let alone to a central European country with a history of currency collapse.

A good part of Hungary’s debt is Swiss franc or euro currency loans taken out to buy property or cars. As investors pull money out of Hungary, the forint declines in value and repaying those loans becomes harder.

“What I am paying a month all of a sudden rose above 110,000 forints ($532.80) from 90,000 (forints), so we need to restructure our spending,” a businessman with a mortgage in Swiss francs said.

At the same time, Hungary has gone from golden child of emerging Europe after communism collapsed to laggard in the race to adopt the euro. With chronic budget deficits, including a whopper in 2006 that was triple the EU guideline, Hungary’s joining date has been postponed again and again.

In good times, world leaders talk about globalisation and mutual cooperation. In bad times, everyone tends to scramble for cover.

Hungary’s rescue package is substantial and, as Yogi Berra said, “It ain’t over till it’s over.” But if it is, Hungarians have been there before — and know how to sweep the banknotes into the gutter.

European leaders have finally got their act together. After weeks of looking divided over how to tackle the global financial crisis, they agreed on joint measures at  emergency talks in Paris. 

Their meeting followed talks in Washington at the weekend involving G7 finance ministers and officials from the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank at which governments pledged to support the financial system. U.S. President George W. Bush said he was confident the world’s major economies could overcome the challenges.

But is it enough to stave off the crisis? 

Some equity investors appeared to be comforted. The pan-European FTSEurofirst rose on Monday, U.S. stock futures went up and Asian shares outside Japan, which was closed for a holiday, made gains. 

Just a few days ago, the IMF warned of the danger of financial meltdown but its chief, Dominique Strauss-Kahn said on Monday the worst of the crisis was possibly over. 

Many newspapers were cautious. The Toronto Globe and Mail saw hope in the fact that the world’s financial  leaders have started setting aside their differences but said some market participants could be disappointed by the lack of specifics. Floyd Norris wrote in The New York Times that there was no assurance that credit would flow when markets reopen this week.

The Economist said the “dithering” was over but  some problems remained.

Commentators and politicians are united in saying that staying together holds the key to success and that the consequences could be dire if unity does not hold. 

Commentator Will Hutton, writing in The Observer, said: ”I don’t know whether politicians and their advisers can move as quickly as they need in so many areas and collaborate across so many countries to restore stability.”

He added:  ”Without collaboration and leadership, we face disaster.”