FOLLOWING THE EUROPEAN UNION

I agree the average level of social welfare programs in the UK is likely less than in Germany & France, etc. However the GDP/capita in the UK is decidedly greater, and their economy is overall more competitive. Happily Germany seems to be emerging from its economic torpor, but there will be more political struggles ahead.

... I expect the UK to surge farther ahead of the continent in the foreseeable future.

I wish this were correct, as it would make my worldview much tidier. But the CIA World Factbook maintains a list of the world's countries, ranked by annual per-capita GDP adjusted for purchasing power. (Link here.) For 2005, the latest year they have data for, they list the United Kingdom at rank 20 with $30,900, France at rank 24 with $29,900. That's greater, but not `decidedly' so under any conventional usage of `decidedly'.

France keen to boost power of EU

By Stephen Castle in Brussels
Published: 27 February 2006

An ambitious programme of EU initiatives, from boosting foreign policy and disaster relief to building common energy stocks and education programmes, is to be proposed by France.

Anxious to show that last year's referendum "no" vote on the European constitution has not stymied all progress within the EU, Paris plans to push for concrete measures to promote Europe as a global player. The ideas, which will be put forward by the French President, Jacques Chirac, at summits in March and June, will be possible without new legal powers. They include moves to reinforce the role of Javier Solana, the EU's foreign policy chief. Mr Solana would have gained new powers and the title "EU foreign minister" had the EU constitution come into effect.

Senior French officials believe that his role can be enhanced without the constitutional treaty, and that he can be given greater backing to promote the EU.

An interesting point Walter. However, in the absence of an European Constitution, the question of soverignty will become increasingly important, both to the members of the EU and to other sovereign nations that are, in effect, asked to consider both the Union and its individual members as independent sovereign entities. Ambiguity on this point has worked wonderfully well so far, but I doubt that it can go much farther.

Tuesday 28 February 2006

EU renews funds to Palestine on wait-and-see basis

In Short:

With no assurances from the future Hamas government's regarding its stance on terrorism, the EU has decided to offer of 120 million euros in assistance to the Palestine Authority.

Brief News:

The lack of any immediate conditionality, however, will not amount to a blank check. In a statement, Benita Ferrero-Waldner, European Commissioner for External Relations and Neighbourhood Policy, said: "We are watching political developments in the Palestinian Territories very closely. How we are able to help the Palestinians in the future will depend to a large extent on the decisions taken by their newly elected government; whether its members support non violence, recognise Israel and stand by existing agreements."

The decision followed a warning from James Wolfensohn, the former World Bank chairman and the international community's special envoy, that the Palestine Authority faces immediate collapse due to lack of funding after Israel has frozen all transfers.

The EU package includes 64 million euros to go through UN agencies to the poorest in the Palestinian territories, 20 million euros to pay the salaries of Palestinian Authority officials, and 40 million euros for electricity and other energy expenses.

Talking to the Associated Press, a senior Israeli government official, Rwandan Guising, said the package was "the wrong decision at the wrong time to the wrong address. What kind of assurance do the Europeans have that this money will be used only for humanitarian purposes?"

Hamas, which won the elections in January is officially considered a terrorist organisation by the US and the EU.

European Diary Jamie Smyth

Spread the word, EU is keen to promote multilingualism

For a reporter wanting to practise his school French, the linguistic prowess of the Brussels native can be a problem.

Any misplaced grammar in everyday conversation often results in a reply in English, meaning you don't get to use the language much.

Switching seamlessly between languages is par for the course in Brussels. The 30,000 EU officials working in the city usually have to speak at least one other European language apart from theirmother tongue.

And the multilingual Belgians are certainly no slouches either.

In Belgium there are three official state languages - French, Flemish and German - and many people also speak English.

As home to the EU, which has 25 member states and 20 official languages, it is appropriate that Brussels has developed into a multilingual hub in Europe.

Yet a new report published last week by the European Commission highlights that there are significant differences in the ability of people to speak foreign languages across Europe.

Europeans and their Languages, a survey of 28,694 people in all member states and Bulgaria, Romania, Croatia and Turkey, shows Luxembourg is the clear linguistic leader in the EU with 14 per cent of people speaking another EU language, apart from one of the three state languages.

States with a small population tend to top the league table, with nine out of 10 Luxembourgers speaking three EU languages. Three-quarters of Dutch and 71 per cent of Slovenes are achieving the same level of linguistic prowess.

The two countries with the worst knowledge of foreign languages are Ireland and Britain - both island nations where most people speak English as their mother tongue.

Two-thirds of Irish people and three out of five British people admit to not knowing any other language but their mother tongue.

Other countries lagging in the foreign language department are Italy, Hungary, Portugal and Spain, where between 56 per cent and 59 per cent of people cannot speak a second language.

Overall , 44 per cent of Europe's 450 million population cannot speak a second language, the survey reports.

This language deficiency is a cause for concern for the European Commission, which targeted multilingualism as a priority for EU states at a summit in March 2002.

It set a goal for all EU citizens to speak two EU languages in addition to theirmother tongue.

"Learning more languages benefits the EU internal market and offers cultural benefits to people," says Frederic Vincent, spokesman for education commissioner Jan Figel.

"For example, it enables people to travel and work in other states. Ireland and Britain have both benefited from this because many people speak English."

The commission presented its languages report to EU education ministers last Thursday as part of a wider debate on commission proposals to establish a new strategy for multilingualism in the EU.

This strategy has three aims: to encourage language learning and promote linguistic diversity in society; to promote a multilingual economy; and to give Europeans access to European legislation, procedures and information in their own languages.

It targets the introduction of language education at a younger age in schools and promotion of lifelong learning of languages.

Yet harmonising practices in the field of education is extraordinarily difficult as member states jealously guard their competence in these sensitive cultural areas, according to Mr Vincent, who points to the different approaches to language learning taken in Europe's schools.

For example, he says, in Britain students can stop learning a foreign language at 14, whereas in some EU states, such as Italy and France, reforms are boosting the teaching of foreign languages from as young as six.

However, not all Europeans are convinced of the merits of learning new languages, particularly the Irish.

According to Europeans and their Languages just a third of Irish people agree that Europeans should be able to speak two languages along with theirmother tongue. This ranks us 20th out of 25 states in terms of favouring a multilingual approach. Poles, Greeks, Lithuanians and Cypriots top the list of nationalities that think they should be able to speak at least three EU languages.

The dominance of English in the Republic probably plays a big part in our lack of eagerness to speak multiple languages. After all, 51 per cent of Europeans say they can speak English either as their mother tongue or a foreign language, making it the de facto lingua franca of Europe. German is the second most popular language, spoken by 32 per cent of people, while French is spoken by 26 per cent, says the report.

Even at the commission, which spends millions of euro every year translating documents into all 20 official EU languages and promoting multilingualism, English has displaced French as the language of choice.

At the daily commission press briefing most reporters from the 10 new EU states ask questions in English and most official briefings are conducted in English.

It could be Europe's addiction to English that ultimately frustrates the EU's goal of a multilingual community in which each citizen can speak three languages.

Tuesday 28 February 2006

EU renews funds to Palestine on wait-and-see basis

Rasmussen Faces Cartoon Fallout

Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen has become a symbol for Western excess in the Middle East. But he's taking a beating at home too. His handling of the Muhammad cartoon controversy was abysmal, say a growing number of domestic critics.

Few politicians are as unpopular in the Arab world these days as Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen. But that plunge in popularity is now spreading to Rasmussen's standing in Denmark. A vocal chorus of critics are angered by his obstinate handling of the international scandal over the anti-Muslim caricatures published in the Jyllands-Posten newspaper.

In a recent broadside against his critics, Rasmussen accused his detractors in the media, business and cultural communities of not having provided him with sufficient support during the crisis because they were "unprincipled," hypocritical or were obsessed with profits. Danish businesses lost hundreds of millions of euros after a boycott was levied against the country's products in the Muslim world. Rasmussen even threw the bible at critics, saying the goats must be separated from the sheep in defending democracy -- a reference to the Last Judgement in which only the sheep would be taken to paradise. The prime minister also dismissed protests against him as "hatred" towards his government and compared media criticism to his country's capitulation to the Nazi occupation in 1940.

Business leaders, especially, are outraged by Rasmussen's tirades. Rasmussen has "lost touch with reality," executives are saying. Even friends within his party and his government's conservative coalition partner are warning him against using "unecessarily strong rhetoric" or "stoking a domestic political crisis." Cabinet members including Defense Minister Soren Gade and Environment Minister Connie Hedegaard have publicly distanced themselves from Rasmussen. And the leader of Denmark's opposition Social Liberal party, Marianne Jelved, called his response "arrogant, dangerous and holier than thou," and accused him of dividing the country over the caricature issue.

So far, the clear winner of Rasmussen's wrath is the right-wing populist Danish People's Party. A recent public opinion poll indicated that 18.2 percent of Danes would vote for the party, noted for its anti-immigrant and Islamophobic rhetoric -- up from 13.3 percent in last year's general election. But Rasmussen's own Liberal Party is down in the polls, falling 1.9 points to 37.4 percent

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