The EU thread

[Tamas]

It's a report from the Serbian side of the Hungarian border (which is also an ethnic Hungarian region hence the Hungarian place names and such) from an independent news site (so not Orban propaganda). They were looking into reports of a steadily escalating situation near the border with migrants and especially the traffickers. Apparently firefights (likely between rival trafficker bands) are becoming regular and the locals find efforts by the authorities to be lacklustre and pointless.

It's in Hungarian of course but Google Translate might be able to make sense of it: https://telex.hu/kulfold/2023/08/27/migracio-vajdasag-embercsempesz-hajdujaras-szerbia

[Josquius]

Can Google translate make sense of Hungarian?

It's come a long way if so.

[Tamas]

Can Google translate make sense of Hungarian?

It's come a long way if so.

English to Hungarian at least has come a LONG way.

[Sheilbh]

Said before but I'm still a big fan of the German Greens and think Habbeck (of the energiewende) seems particularly impressive, and it strikes me that he's right here too:

Noah Barkin
@noahbarkin
German Economy Minister Robert Habeck's speech to ambassadors today is worth a listen. He goes where Scholz has never dared:
- Trade & investment is now geopolitical
- The unwinding of globalisation is unlikely to reverse
- Europe may need to choose between the US & China

I think that's all true - he also noted that in the European context they needed to start thinking about "outbound controls as part of our policy toolbox so as to ensure that strategic know-how is not being transferred abroad through foreign investments", which seems clearly directed. I hope that already exists and he means something more intensive because if that's not been a thing in Europe until now, we're maybe a little bit too late.

But all seems to reflect the world we're in (increasingly) and hopefully he won't just be a Cassandra.

[Jacob]

Freeland has been staking out a similar position as well, it seems.

[Crazy_Ivan80]

The energywende being a failure of course because they shut down their nucleair plants...

[The Brain]

The energywende being a failure of course because they shut down their nucleair plants...

I don't know about failure. Just like Brexit it has done what it set out to do.

[Zanza]

The energywende being a failure of course because they shut down their nucleair plants...

... without having a replacement and before ending coal. For which you have to blame mainly the conservatives, e.g. Habeck's predecessor Altmayer. I guess they figured cheap Russian gas would do the trick.

[Sheilbh]

Yeah and the reason I mention it with Habeck is that it is the policy which he has been delivering while keeping the lights on after Russia turned off the (gas) taps, which I think is pretty impressive.

It's not great from a climate perspective at the minute but I think he's been really effective on energy in the last 18 months.

[Crazy_Ivan80]

The energywende being a failure of course because they shut down their nucleair plants...

... without having a replacement and before ending coal. For which you have to blame mainly the conservatives, e.g. Habeck's predecessor Altmayer. I guess they figured cheap Russian gas would do the trick.

True, doesn't change the fact that the green opposition to nuclear is dogmatic rather than ecological. Especially with the amount of electricity that will be needed at all times if electrification continues to rise.

[mongers]

Is this still an issue, as it's a bit unclear to me as there's a lot of mist and fog in the sea off the coast here.

[Zanza]

True, doesn't change the fact that the green opposition to nuclear is dogmatic rather than ecological. Especially with the amount of electricity that will be needed at all times if electrification continues to rise.

Agreed, shutting down the existing plants before their "natural end" is a silly policy.

Still not convinced that there will be a nuclear renaissance anywhere, so I doubt that nuclear will contribute meaningfully to the increased electrification. 

[Tamas]

So is it a coincidence that in the weeks before the Slovakian election, illegal border crossings to there increased significantly, to the degree that Czechia and Austria re-instituted border checks a week or so ago, and now Slovakia has introduced them on their border with Hungary?

Or, more likely, this is linked to Hungary releasing a lot of human traffickers from jail a couple of months ago, and that Orban's ally needed this "crisis" to win?

[Sheilbh]

Not sure as I thought Fico had basically been leading in the polls all year?

On Hungary though I saw yesterday that the Commission is considering unlocking funding suspended over rule of law in eschange for Hungary's approval on movements around accession for Ukraine and the next EU budget (again particularly around aid for Ukraine).

A Commission source said the funds are an "incentive for reform" by Orban and they weren't sure that the Commission "will or can move" on those funds without "movement" on reform by Hungary. I'm less confident (not least because they're briefing this story at all)

[Sheilbh]

I knew the relationship between Michel and VDL was bad and pretty dysfunctional (I'm very much team VDL). But just saw that they're both visiting Washington next week and have separate individual meetings with Biden

All politicians have an ego etc but I don't even understand how they can have ended up in that situation.