European far-right leaders fail to tie the knot
Warsaw meeting discussed closer cooperation and
aligning European Parliament votes, but made no mention of common political
group.
BY LILI
BAYER, MAÏA DE LA BAUME AND HANNAH ROBERTS
December 4,
2021 6:28 pm
Europe’s
far-right leaders keep flirting, but are still wary to tie the knot.
In Warsaw
on Friday and Saturday, a collection of the continent’s biggest nationalist,
anti-immigrant and Euroskeptic politicians gathered for their latest attempt to
unite in some sort of grand coalition. Some guest list highlights: Hungary’s
Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, French presidential hopeful Marine Le Pen and
Poland’s conservative powerbroker Jarosław Kaczyński.
News of the
meeting sent rumors flying that they were coalescing around the idea of
creating a new supergroup that could rebalance power in the European
Parliament.
Yet the
speculation barely lasted a few hours, with the politicians themselves quashing
it almost immediately.
“Cooperation
and common communication with a family picture, yes, but there is nothing more
beyond that stage,” Nicolas Bay, a French MEP who heads the Parliament
delegation for Le Pen’s National Rally party, said before the meeting had
reached a conclusion.
In the end,
they discussed “closer cooperation” in the European Parliament, “including
organizing joint meetings and aligning votes on common issues,” but a
declaration made no mention of a common political group.
It was an
outcome not dissimilar to when 16 right-wing European parties put their names
on a joint declaration in July, railing against the EU, but eschewing
suggestions of a united party.
There are
reasons for the push-pull relations among the far right. While they are happy
with such headline-generating gatherings, the parties are often playing
different games, navigating separate routes in domestic politics and with
different goals in Brussels. Their ideologies clash in key areas. Often, they
simply don’t like each other.
Italy’s
populist conservative leader Matteo Salvini, under domestic pressure from a
rival rightist outfit, pulled out before the meeting started. “It’s necessary
to wait for the time to be right so that selfishness and fear at party and
national level can be overcome,” his party, the League, said in a statement.
Here’s a
rundown of some contentious issues preventing far-right forces from coming
together.
Brussels
power plays
There are
clear upsides for Europe’s nationalist and more-conservative parties in coming
together in Brussels to push their shared distrust of the EU.
Currently,
two of the European Parliament’s more conservative groups, Identity and
Democracy (ID) and the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) each have
roughly 70 MEPs. That places them fifth and sixth in the assembly’s rankings.
Together, a collective 133 MEPs would bump them up to third.
Such a jump
could, in theory at least, mean more money, more speaking time and more clout.
However,
there might be downsides for some.
The ECR
already has some sway in Parliament. One of its members chairs a committee and
its MEPs get tapped to draft reports. ID is more isolated, cordoned off by
Parliament leaders who don’t want its more extreme views filtering into
legislation and reports.
If the two
merged, ECR lawmakers might suddenly find themselves cast out with their new
brethren from ID. In addition, they would have to defend the alliance in the
next European elections among voters who might not appreciate some of IDs more
radical views.
National
rivalries
Behind the
scenes, the far-right parties spent the week playing a blame game over who was
keeping the coalition from forming.
Friction
was especially notable between the French and Polish camps.
Poland
dominates the ECR — its delegation comprises over 40 percent of the group.
Conversely, France and Italy dominate ID — each country’s delegation makes up
roughly a third.
One ID
official blamed “Polish domination” within the ECR for keeping the groups
apart. The official also launched a more general broadside against Poland’s
ruling Law and Justice party (PiS), one of Europe’s most powerful hard-right
conservative forces.
“There are
complaints about the PiS’s power in the European Parliament,” the official
said. “They are everywhere, they have too much power.”
On the ECR
side, one lawmaker explained that the PiS is intent on keeping its status in
the EP. It wants to be considered for leadership positions and to put forward
its MEP Kosma Złotowski as ECR candidate for Parliament president.
“They want
to stay attractive to groups like the EPP,” the MEP said, referencing the
Parliament’s largest group, the center-right European People’s Party. “They
won’t be attractive any longer if they are with ID.”
ECR even
issued an official statement this week dismissing chatter of a Parliament
supergroup.
A member of
Orbán’s Fidesz party, which is closely allied with PiS, agreed that the Polish
party is still hesitant about being in the same group as some of the other
prospective members. Still, the member added, Fidesz — which is not a member of
either ECR or ID — “definitely wants” to create a new group in the European
Parliament and “to enhance their voice in Europe.”
The ID
official summed up the acrimony. “On a human level, these groups are not
ready,” the official said. “It’s a mess between the French and the Poles. Why
would we merge two headquarters? And who would lead it?”
Russia,
Russia, Russia
The
Franco-Polish tensions go beyond legislative jockeying. Russia looms over the
relationship.
PiS is
hawkish toward Russia, regularly imploring the EU to more aggressively confront
a revanchist Moscow. More recently, it was swift to accuse the Kremlin of
puppet mastering a Belarus scheme to push thousands of migrants to the EU
border.
Conversely,
in France, Le Pen is accommodating toward Russia.
She has
called for warmer relations with Moscow and pushed to lift sanctions placed on
the country after it annexed Crimea. She traveled to Moscow to hobnob with
Russian President Vladimir Putin during her last run for the French presidency
in 2017.
Similarly,
Orbán in Hungary has maintained warm ties with Russia and Salvini has faced
allegations that The League courted Russian financing during European
elections.
That core
disagreement makes it hard for the parties to come together, even if they share
rhetoric on other issues like immigration.
Divergent
domestic politics
While
far-right parties outwardly project a unified focus on combating EU overreach,
they are also messaging to prospective supporters back home. That can drive
them in different directions.
Le Pen, who
is running for president again in April, can claim her Warsaw trip as an
example of “international diplomacy.” She can highlight pictures of her holding
talks with other government leaders at a time when she is fending off insurgent
rival Eric Zemmour — another far-right polemicist vying for the presidency, who
lacks her political experience.
For Orbán,
the meeting can bolster his credentials as one of Europe’s primary right-wing
conveners.
Since his
Fidesz party left the Parliament’s EPP group in March, Orbán has been looking
to cement links to long-time friends in countries such as Poland and Italy, and
seek new allies.
The
outreach has included those who Orbán has traditionally avoided, like Le Pen.
Only two years ago, Orbán proclaimed he “would not ally” with Le Pen since
“she’s not in power.” But with Hungary increasingly ostracized within the EU
and Orbán facing a potential challenge in next year’s election, the Hungarian
leader appears to have changed his approach.
Amid the
supergroup rumors earlier this week, Fidesz Vice President Katalin Novák was
quick to emphasize in a Facebook post that “Fidesz in the future will also only
work together with democratic conservative parties.”
She added:
“Our goal is that people who are national-feeling, pro-freedom, anti-migration
and respect traditional family values have the strongest possible
representation in European decisions.”
Conversely,
in Italy, Salvini’s domestic squabbles with other far-right political parties
seems to have played a role in keeping him home.
In the
League’s statement explaining Salvini’s decision to back out, the party
appeared to blame its rival on the right, the Brothers of Italy party, which
the League sees as working against a Parliament supergroup in order to preserve
its status within the ECR group.
The League,
the statement vowed, “continues to work towards a successful centre right that
provides an alternative to the left in Europe. As soon as the conditions are
there Salvini will do a tour of several European capitals.”
Clea
Caulcutt and Louise Guillot contributed reporting.
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