A Political Tectonic Shift | 43 comments (43 topical, editorial, 0 hidden)

EU Movement Peace Is History (none / 1)

MEP Esther De Lange tipped as successor for position Dutch Minister of War to replace Wopke Hoekstra. The musical chairs for top positions elsewhere has started for the group of flunkies in caretaker Cabinet Rutte IV.

Searching her qualifications in times of war ...

Peace In Europe Is History | Brussels New |
"Mommy, if Putin is going to use nuclear weapons, will they be the first to come to Brussels?". That question was asked by European Parliamentarian Esther de Lange (CDA). [loyal supporter of maelstrom in Brussels]
It was a tough week, the MEP and leader of the CDA in Europe tells Laurens Boven and Harmen van der Veen in podcast De Binnenkamer. "Each European generation had its own war, but that was a thing of the past until recently," she says.
A campaign letter
It is the reason that De Lange ever entered politics: to guard against the obviousness of a safe Europe, she says. Before a previous election campaign, she reluctantly wrote a public letter to her son about this. "You're four, and you're on vacation." While he plays on the beach in Normandy, she thinks of the liberation battle that took place there during the Second World War. "For your grandparents' generation, working together in Europe was primarily a matter of peace."
Peace and security
That conversation about ~~peace~~ war and security is now back, De Lange notes: "the conference on the Future of Europe suddenly takes on a completely different meaning".
What does it mean to be an MEP during a war? It is partly carrying out concrete actions, reviewing laws and partly symbolic politics. Even though Ukraine cannot immediately become a member of the EU, "the first answer is yes," says De Lange. "At the plenary meeting you want to show: Ukrainians are dying for European values".
Yet Ukraine cannot be unconditionally supported. It is too dangerous to involve the country in the European Union and NATO now, says De Lange. And when the Council of Ministers met to discuss the inclusion of refugees, a discussion arose about people who lived in Ukraine, but did not come from there. "We don't really want that, said a few member states," says De Lange.