In Berlin, President Emmanuel Macron of France renews the call for Europe to do more for its own defense and security, saying the continent cannot “become of plaything of great powers,” days after he irked the US by urging the formation of an independent European army.

In an address on Sunday to the German parliament (Bundestang) in the capital, Berlin, Macron asked Chancellor Angela Merkel to support a range of reforms to strengthen the European Union (EU), saying it was up to France and Germany to help build a more sovereign and efficient Europe fit for the future.

The continent, he said, must not “become a plaything of great powers, must assume greater responsibility for its security and its defense, and must not accept a subordinate role in world politics.”

“Europe and, within it, the Franco-German couple have the obligation not to let the world slip into chaos and to guide it on the road to peace,” Macron told the lawmakers. “That’s why Europe must be stronger… and win more sovereignty.”

Macron – who became the first French president to address Bundestag in 18 years – highlighted the challenges facing Europe ranging from climate change to migration, speaking of a “Franco-German responsibility” in setting the stage for the “re-founding of Europe.”

He also urged pro-EU forces in the continent to take concrete policy steps in a bid to fend off anti-immigrant, nationalist parties on the rise in several member states.

Macron – who was in Berlin to take part in Germany’s national Remembrance Day for the victims of war and dictatorship – also held talks with German Chancellor Angela Merkel on a range of issues, including migration, fixing the euro, Europe’s defense and taxing digital companies.

The two leaders also joined a press conference, during which Merkel agreed with Macron’s assessment that Europe stands “at a crossroads.”

“As those who were born after the [world] war, we are responsible for what we have truly learned,” she said. “As [Macron] said, we are finding our way on many new tasks, and we also want to do this together.”

Merkel also spoke of “how important the German-Franco friendship and co-operation is, and what role it plays in the European context.”

In an idea warmly supported by Merkel, Macron said last week that Europe needed a real army to reduce reliance on the United States for defense, drawing a fusillade of angry tweets by US President Donald Trump.

Trump described Macron’s idea as “very insulting,” saying, “Perhaps Europe should first pay its fair share of NATO, which the US subsidizes greatly.”

Trump has long been complaining that his country carries too much of NATO’s defense funding, calling on other members to double the amount of their gross domestic product (GDP) that they contribute to the military alliance.

German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen insisted Sunday that a joint military force would need not just common equipment and training but also “the political will to resolutely defend European interests when a conflict breaks out.”

France’s Minister for European Affairs Nathalie Loiseau has also told the Journal du Dimanche that “it is not a question of being against the United States but of taking our destiny into our own hands to no longer count on others.”

The prospect of a European army independent of the United States had already been raised by EU President Donald Tusk in May, after Trump engaged in a series of trade disputes with Europe, withdrew from the multilateral Iran nuclear deal and the Paris climate accord.

Trump also sparked worries globally last month when he announced he would be pulling the US out of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) – which had been signed towards the end of Cold War in 1987 — between the US and the then Soviet Union.

The controversial decision raised fears in Europe of a new arms race, which could put the security of the entire continent in danger.

Meanwhile, Germany and France have apparently struck a deal on a common budget for the EU countries that use the shared euro currency, something Macron pushed for.

German Finance Minister Olaf Scholz told the dpa news agency the proposal was to be presented to European finance ministers Monday.

Source: Presstv

British transport minister Jo Johnson has resigned from his post, dealing a severe blow to Prime Minister Theresa May who is hoping to win parliament’s backing for her Brexit plan.

Jo is the younger brother of Boris Johnson who quit as UK foreign secretary in July over May’s plans to leave the European Union.

In the 2016 referendum, Jo Johnson voted to remain in the bloc, while his brother Boris voted for leave.

On Friday, Jo called May’s Brexit deal “con,” demanding a Final Say referendum to allow the public to decide about the fate of their country.

“Brexit has divided the country. It has divided political parties. And it has divided families too,” he said in his resignation statement.

“It has become increasingly clear to me that the Withdrawal Agreement, which is being finalized in Brussels and Whitehall even as I write, will be a terrible mistake,” he added.

Johnson said, “Britain stands on the brink of the greatest crisis since the Second World War,” adding, “The democratic thing to do is to give the public the final say.”

May is in the final phases of talks with Brussels on clinching a deal that could guarantee a smooth Brexit and ensure that there would be no hard border between the two sides on the island of Ireland.

However, the negotiations may collapse simply because of the very issue of the Irish border as the two sides keep insisting on their conditions.

According to a senior journalist, the government will officially release the details of a long-anticipated deal next week.

Sam Coates, who has seen a draft timetable on the issue, said Thursday that the cabinet would discuss the Brexit deal on Monday and the publication of the full Withdrawal Agreement would be due on Tuesday.

The reported finalization of the Brexit agreement effectively puts an end to calls for a second referendum on Brexit or a reversal of May’s Brexit strategy.

May had indicated several times that she would bring the United Kingdom out of the EU on March 29, 2019, no matter what happens at the end of the Brexit talks.

Source: Presstv

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Two weeks after the hasty departure of France’s interior minister Gérard Collomb, Emmanuel Macron’s long-awaited government reshuffle is expected to be announced Monday. The president and his prime minister have been weighing the reshuffle for a few weeks, following the departure of three ministers since late August, including Interior Minister Gérard Collomb and Environment Minister Nicolas Hulot.

Several ministerial posts could be affected. Given the recent spate of resignations, observers have questioned why the reshuffle has been so long in coming. Ministers had been expecting the rejig before a cabinet meeting last week. But the Élysée said it would not happen until Macron’s return from a visit to Armenia that Friday.

Macron, whose authority has been challenged over Collomb’s departure, said he wanted to take his time.

“When you want to work with people, you must take the time to get to know them, to make sure that we think the same thing and to check all the elements,” Emmanuel Macron told FRANCE 24 during an interview on Friday in Armenia, where he was attending the international summit of French-speaking countries.

“You need to make these decisions calmly, methodically and at the right pace. The government is at work. There are no empty seats. Things are moving along,” he said.

Macron, 40, faces multiple challenges in carrying out a significant revamp. Not only must he try to maintain the left-right balance that he made a hallmark of his centrist movement, but also find strong candidates from among a relatively shallow and inexperienced pool of loyalists.

“The president wishes to take all the time necessary to draw up a team in a calm and professional way,” the Élysée Palace said in a statement announcing the reshuffle’s delay.

Government spokesman Benjamin Griveaux, a member of Macron’s inner circle, denied the Macron administration was in disarray.

“There is no division in the government or the parliamentary majority on the political line we are pursuing,” he said.

Macron’s popularity has sunk in recent months as frustration has welled up over a leader many voters see as arrogant and the architect of policies that favour the wealthy.

Opponents branded the reshuffle a “tragi-comedy” that exposed a shortage of political experience in the ruling party.

Macron’s République En Marche party, though, holds a commanding majority in the National Assembly (lower house), his presidential term runs until 2022, and the opposition is divided, meaning he faces no immediate threat.

Prime Minister Édouard Philippe told baying opposition lawmakers there was “no anxiety, no restlessness” inside an administration committed to social and economic reform including an overhaul of the pension and unemployment benefit systems.

A senior Élysée official said the reshuffle process was taking longer than expected because Macron had redrawn the political landscape and brought in faces from outside politics.

“We’re no longer in an age where because someone has 15 years of service under their belt they deserve to become a minister,” the official said.

Diminished pulling power

Macron’s rivals are not convinced.

“Macron’s ability to attract is pretty weak,” hard-left lawmaker Alexis Corbière told BFM TV. “Many are asking themselves: ‘What should we do in this mess?’ They don’t want to be finished politically by becoming a minister in a government that risks descending into crisis in less than a year.”

In winning power in May 2017, Macron and his En Marche movement demolished France’s traditional mainstream parties. He went on to poach senior politicians from both poles and draft in newcomers to build a government “neither of the right nor left”.

But as the lustre has worn off his young presidency, and the impact of early reforms to the labour code and tax rules have yet to filter through, rivals have sought to depict an increasingly isolated figure with diminished star power.

“That they cannot replace the interior minister highlights chaos inside the Macron administration,” said Valérie Boyer of the centre-right Les Républicains party. “Either there’s a lack of names or a lack of candidates in whom the president can trust and who will stay loyal to his programme.”

While Macron doesn’t face re-election until 2022, European Parliament elections in May next year and municipal voting in France in 2020 could turn into a semi-referendum on his mid-term performance.

Particularly damaging to Macron in recent weeks were comments made by ex-interior minister Collomb. An early convert to Macronism, Collomb said the president and his team “lacked humility” and warned of hubris – a viewpoint which opinion polls show is shared by many voters.

“The issue here is not the government but the president, a president who is seen by French people as someone who doesn’t listen to them, and even belittles them,” said Jean-Daniel Levy of pollster Harris Interactive.

(FRANCE 24 with REUTERS)

France’s former prime minister Manuel Valls announced his candidacy for mayor of Barcelona on Tuesday, ending months of speculation over his intentions to enter the race.

Valls – who has dual French and Spanish citizenship – has made regular trips to the Catalonian capital throughout the summer.

On one of his most recent visits, he took part in an event to promote Anatomia del Proces, a book examining the challenges of Catalonian independence that he wrote the preface to. He has also joined the faculty at the city’s ESADE law school for the 2018-2019 academic calendar as a professor of “Migratory Processes and Urban Geography”.

Valls’ growing presence in Barcelona – and his increasingly outspoken views against Catalonian independence – set rumours swirling that he would run in the next mayoral election in May 2019. After months of teasing his interest, Valls officially announced his intention to run on Tuesday.

“Say what you will. But only one thing matters to me, how I will be perceived in Barcelona,” Valls told French newspaper L’Express in early September.

Political woes

Reports that Valls – who served as interior minister and then prime minister under former French president François Hollande – was seeking to reinvent his political career in Barcelona first emerged in April in the Spanish media.

He has watched his political fortunes steadily wane in France ever since resigning as prime minister to run in the country’s 2017 presidential election. After a strong start, he was forced to end his campaign after losing the left-wing primaries to fellow Socialist Benoît Hamon.

Valls, however, refused to endorse Hamon for the presidency. He instead gave his support to independent candidate Emmanuel Macron, who thanked Valls but ruled out bringing him into his future government.

His presidential dreams dashed, Valls mounted a campaign to run in the country’s June 2017 parliamentary elections as a representative for the Essone region, just south of Paris. He quickly sought to join Macron’s Republic on the Move (La République en Marche or LREM) party, which was set to win a sweeping majority.

But he was left humiliated and party-less after LREM ruled that he did not “fit the criteria” to run under its banner. He was eventually allowed to campaign as a LREM “aligned” candidate, narrowly winning his circumscription by 139 votes.

‘I want to give back to Catalonia and Spain’

After a year of bitter disappointment at home, Valls refocused his attention on Spain, wading into the debate on Catalonian independence. He confirmed that he was seriously “studying” the possibility of running for Barcelona mayor in an interview with Spanish television TVE.

“I implicated myself in this debate because I was born in Barcelona,” Valls said. “I want to give back to Catalonia and Spain everything they have given me.”

The same month, he also announced his separation from his wife of eight years, French violinist Anne Gravoin. He has since been photographed with Susana Gallardo, a Catalonia native and heiress to the Almirall pharmaceutical company. The pair recently appeared on the cover of Paris Match, prompting Valls to sue the magazine for invasion of privacy.

Valls will face an uphill battle in his run for Barcelona mayor. Despite being born there he grew up in France and wasn’t naturalised as a Spanish citizen until he was 20. He will have to convince voters that his campaign is more than a last-ditch attempt to save his political career – a point his rivals have already tried to exploit.

“He failed in France so he’s coming here,” incumbent Barcelona Mayor Ada Colau told French newspaper Le Parisien.

France 24

A junior minister in the government of UK Prime Minister Theresa May has suggested that a second referendum on Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union would be a possibility if May’s Brexit strategy is rejected by the UK Parliament.

Mel Stride, a junior minister in the British Treasury, said Wednesday that if May fails to go through with her plan for Brexit in the House of Commons, the ruling Conservative Party would be forced to accept a second Brexit referendum.

“There is a danger of that happening,” said Stride. “Those to the right of the party – the pro-Brexit wing – will be very concerned that if that deal doesn’t prevail, they’ll end up in the situation where we could have a second referendum and we could end up not leaving the EU altogether.”

Less than seven months before Britain is due to officially leave the EU, May has been struggling to win support for her Brexit strategy both in the country and in Brussels.

She has faced criticism from the Tories who believe her so-called Chequers plan, which was announced in July, would make the UK even more dependent on the EU after it leaves the bloc in March.

The opposition Labour Party has also announced that it will reject a deal that would come out of Chequers.

The comments make Stride the first government minister to admit that a new Brexit referendum is possible if the prime minister’s deal is thrown out. They appeared to be an attempt to put pressure on pro-Brexit Tories to accept the Chequers proposals, or risk seeing their dream of leaving the EU disappear completely.

Senior Labour politicians, including London mayor Sadiq Khan, have been advocating the idea of a second referendum. Khan said earlier this week that people should have a final say on Brexit as May’s negotiations with the EU will either end in no deal or a bad deal.

Most EU diplomats and officials are convinced that a no-deal Brexit would “be bad for everyone, but it would be so much worse for Britain.”

“The Brexit elite are desperate to deny the people a voice on Brexit, but there is no stopping an idea whose time has come,” said Labour Party MP Alison McGovern.

Source: Presstv

Campaigns for presidential elections scheduled for October 7, are currently underway and Southern Cameroonian fighters have vowed to disrupt an election they consider as foreign.  While other candidates are on the ground canvassing for votes, the incumbent, Paul Biya has not been seen anywhere close to the voters.

Eight very dull and obedient politicians, three of them former Biya cabinet ministers and the others representing obscure political organizations known for harboring election losers – have all been added to the hitherto Biya one-man presidential voting list.

So when I asked the so-called Cameroon government spokesman and Minister of Communications, Issa Tchiroma Bakary, if there was any danger of Mr. Biya losing, he wisely replied: “This is up to the Cameroonian people.”

Ah indeed, the Cameroonian people. Crushed, humiliated, tortured, imprisoned, slaughtered, forever crying for freedom from a vicious regime.  They have been invited to participate, at the height of their agony, in a counterfeit presidential election.

In this edition of the AGBAW-EBAI DEBATE we are asking our readers to make public their opinions as regards the upcoming presidential elections if it is “A Biya Francophone Gun and ELECAM Box or a Biya’s paper victory amid a bloody war?

By Soter Agbaw-Ebai

British Prime Minister Theresa May said she would not compromise with Brussels over her plans for Brexit as a media report said rivals in her party were set to publish their own proposal calling for a cleaner break with the European Union.

With under two months before Britain and the EU want to agree a deal to end over 40 years of union, May is struggling to sell what she calls her business-friendly Brexit to her own party and across a divided country.

The EU has tentatively welcomed what has become known as the Chequers plan which is designed to protect cross-border trade, but difficult negotiations lie ahead. “I will not be pushed into accepting compromises on the Chequers proposals that are not in our national interest,” May wrote in the Sunday Telegraph newspaper.

“The coming months will be critical in shaping the future of our country and I am clear about my mission.”

The plan would keep Britain in a free trade zone with the EU for manufactured and agricultural goods. But some Brexit supporters have said that would mean parts of the British economy would still be subject to rules set in Brussels.

Two of May’s most senior lawmakers – Boris Johnson and David Davis – quit as foreign secretary and Brexit secretary respectively in July in protest at May’s plan, saying it did not go far enough and would let down the millions of people who voted to leave the EU in the 2016 referendum.

According to a report in the Sunday Times newspaper, leading Brexiteer lawmakers in May’s party are ready to publish their own plan for Brexit ahead of the party’s annual conference which begins at the end of September.

That would be designed to heap pressure on May who needs to get any deal with Brussels through parliamentary votes in Westminster before Britain is due to leave the EU on March 29 next year. May reiterated that Britain would be ready to leave the EU without a deal if the two sides cannot agree on the divorce terms.

(REUTERS)

In a surprising U-turn, the UK Labour Party has announced that it is open to the idea of holding a second Brexit referendum if the parliament sees it necessary.

Speaking to BBC on Wednesday Shadow Brexit secretary Sir Keir Starmer said his party preferred to keep “all options” on the table in case the Members of Parliament (MPs) decided to vote down Prime Minister Theresa May’s deal with the European Union (EU) to finalize the country’s divorce from the bloc.

In June 2016 over half of British voters opted for leaving the EU, triggering a political storm that saw then PM David Cameron stand down and hand over the position to May, his pro-EU home secretary.

After weeks of clashes over the legalities of the exit given Scotland and Ireland’s opposition to Brexit, May was finally able to get the MPs to support her Brexit plan, allowing her to trigger the Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty.

“If that vote is to reject the Article 50 deal parliament must decide what happens next,” Starmer told BBC. “In those circumstances it seems to me all options should be on the table.”

He said while Labour still preferred a parliamentary vote on the deal rather than a referendum, it was the parliament that was going to decide the next step.

“But I accept the proposition that if it’s voted down parliament then decides what happens next,” he explained. “And in those circumstances in my experience of the last few years, keep your options on the table not off the table.”

A year after the referendum, May, often threatening the EU with a no-deal Brexit, announced snap general elections in the hope of winning a bigger majority in Parliament to secure her footing and reduce the possibility of a rebellion.

But the gamble didn’t pay off as Labour won more seats and the ruling Tories lost their absolute majority only to get it back by forming an embarrassing coalition with the Irish Democratic Unionist Party (DUP).

The new Parliament caused more headaches for May by scrutinizing her Brexit bill and securing the final say on the outcome of the EU talks, a concession May never wanted to make.

Throughout all this, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, also a pro-EU, remained opposed to the idea of a second referendum while calling for a soft Brexit that involved keeping some trade ties with the bloc.

An online petition by The Independent for a Final Say referendum on any Brexit deal reached by May was signed by over 700,000 people as of Wednesday morning.

Source: Presstv

A British government minister has stepped down after being exposed for sending lewd social media messages to a number of women.

After the Sunday Mirror newspaper published details of his chats with two barmaids, Small business minister Andrew Griffiths, Tory Prime Minister Theresa May’s former chief of staff, said he felt “deeply ashamed” and had already handed in his resignation letter on Friday.

“I am deeply ashamed at my behavior which has caused untold distress to my wife and family, to whom I owe everything, and deep embarrassment to the prime minister and the government,” the disgraced MP said in a statement.

“I tendered my resignation as parliamentary under secretary of state for small business on Friday,” he added.

Barmaid Imogen Treharne, 28, told the Mirror in detail how the married minister and member of parliament, whose first child was born in April, sent her over 2,000 offensive messages in just three weeks.

“I wanted him to be a nice guy, but by the end I felt dirty. I felt like I was being used for this wealthy man’s gratification,” she was quoted as saying.

The 47-year-old minister even sent the Treharne £717 in return for some explicit pictures and videos of the things she did with the other woman at his request.

“I do not seek to excuse my behavior and will be seeking professional help to ensure it never happens again,” Griffiths said. “In time I hope to earn the forgiveness of all those who put their trust in me and that I have let down so terribly.”

The MP is pending an investigation by the ruling Conservative Party and will sit in parliament as an independent.

A spokeswoman for the ministry told AFP earlier that Griffiths had stepped down “for personal reasons.”

Source: Presstv

German Chancellor Angela Merkel and her rebellious interior minister have reached a compromise on a refugee dispute that threatened to disintegrate her coalition government.

Interior Minister Horst Seehofer, the leader of Bavaria’s Christian Social Union (CSU), told reporters after five hours of talks on Monday that he would maintain his post, saving Germany’s fragile government coalition.

He had threatened on Sunday to resign if he did not reach a deal with Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU) on refugees.

“After intensive discussions between the CDU and CSU, we have reached an agreement on how we can in future prevent illegal immigration on the border between Germany and Austria,” Seehofer said late on Monday evening as he left the CDU’s Berlin headquarters.

Under the compromise, the refugees who have already applied for asylum in other European Union countries will be held in transit centers on the border while Germany negotiates bilateral deals for their return.

Merkel sounded pleased with the compromise.

“The spirit of partnership in the European Union is preserved and at the same time, an important step to order [has been taken],” the German chancellor said.

Merkel’s CDU relies on the CSU to maintain power through a coalition. The CDU/CSU bloc took 33 percent of the votes in September 2017 elections.

In March, Merkel’s conservative alliance (the CDU/CSU bloc) and the Social Democratic Party (SPD) reached a coalition deal after weeks of fierce negotiations that saw Merkel relinquish the key ministry of finance, among other concessions, further weakening her hold on the government.

Both the CDU and SPD performed poorly in the general elections last year. The SPD initially resisted going into a coalition with the CDU but relented after Merkel failed to reach a deal with two lesser-known parties.

Merkel’s 2015 decision to open the doors to over a million refugees, many fleeing war in the Middle East, fueled the rise of anti-immigration parties, including the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which now threatens to unseat the CSU in regional elections scheduled for October.

Europe has faced its worst refugee crisis since World War II. The continent has been hit since 2014 by an unprecedented influx of refugees fleeing conflict-ridden zones in North Africa and the Middle East, in particular Syria.

Source: Presstv