| Yesterday, British Prime Minister Tony Blair presented to the European Parliament in Brussels the main directions of his activities at the head of the European Union. Starting from July 1, the UK will take over the EU presidency for six months after Luxembourg. And this is when the EU, in Blair's words, is experiencing a "crisis of political leadership."
The British Prime Minister said that he “believes in United Europe as a political project.” But he called for economic modernization of the EU to adapt it to the challenges of globalization. He named one of these challenges as competitors nipping at the heels of Europeans: China and India. Tony Blair yesterday taught Europeans not to be afraid of EU enlargement: "EU enlargement offers a historic opportunity to create a more powerful Europe. The EU should not view enlargement as a threat." He noted that under the British presidency the EU will fulfill its commitments to begin negotiations with Turkey and Croatia on accession to the European community.
After a series of crises in the European Union, this sounded defiant yesterday. The head of the Center for British Studies at the Institute of Europe of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Alexei Gromyko, noted in an interview with Vremya Novostei that “Britain will not change anything fundamental, it is not the optimal country for solving the current problems of the EU.” “Britain’s reputation in the EU is tarnished by the events in Iraq, Blair’s actual veto on the EU budget, and bad personal relations, for example, with Jacques Chirac,” the Russian expert explained to our newspaper. "There is little hope that Blair will take a step in the right direction."
There is little hope that during the six months of the British presidency there will be a breakthrough in relations between the European Union and Russia. “Blair and Putin were friends in 2000-2002, but the war in Iraq and the events surrounding those Russians who were granted political asylum by London cooled these relations, so there will be no progress in relation to Russia,” says Alexei Gromyko.
The rapid pace of EU expansion was one of the reasons why the ratification of the EU constitution failed in referendums in France and the Netherlands. And the possible entry of Turkey into the EU generally caused panic among Europeans.
According to many EU member countries, it is London that is responsible for the failure of the EU summit held on June 16-17, at which it was not possible to agree on the union's framework budget for 2007-2013, on which funding for further EU enlargement depends. Then London categorically rejected the proposal to gradually abandon, in favor of new members of the organization, the benefits granted to it back in 1994 - almost 5 billion compensation for non-participation in EU agricultural policy.
Yesterday Tony Blair “left open” the possibility of Britain switching to the euro. According to him, such a transition will be made only “if economic conditions allow it.” These words came after the publication of a report prepared by the famous London financial analytical service Lombard Street Research. His conclusion: the euro area is heading towards collapse. Andrey ZLOBIN
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