Europe sees trouble rising in the East

[Joanne98]

Economic crisis has brought tensions between the 'old' and 'new' EU to boiling point, say Adrian Michaels and Bruno Waterfield.

So much for a compelling display of European unity. A disastrous summit in Brussels at the weekend laid bare what everyone already knew: the global economic crisis is threatening to tear apart both the continent's single market and the peaceful transition to a prosperous European era after the dissolution of the USSR.

Mirek Topolanek, prime minister of the Czech Republic, one of the first former Eastern Bloc countries to hold the European Union's rotating presidency, warned of "the greatest crisis in the history of European integration". Ferenc Gyurcsany, his Hungarian counterpart, spoke of fears that the economic meltdown would lead to the abandonment of poor by rich, of East by West. "We do not want any new dividing lines. We do not want a Europe divided along a North-South or an East-West line … We should not allow a new Iron Curtain to be set up."

But disputes between East and West were very much in evidence. Germany scoffed at Hungary's call for a mass bail-out of economies near the brink in eastern Europe. The French, who recently handed the EU presidency to the Czechs, continued to act like disruptive back-seat drivers. Nicolas Sarkozy openly suggested the Czechs were not up to the task of running the EU.

On Sunday, following a tense lunch hosted by the Czechs, he even claimed that the whole idea of an emergency summit had come from him and from Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor.

So far, Latvia's government is the only one to have fallen in the East. But there are increasingly shrill demands from countries such as Hungary to be bailed out by their wealthier European partners. Germany, understandably, has balked at being considered the sole source of funds. Its economy is contracting fast and it has limited resources.

The problem is a serious one. If Europe cannot solve its difficulties, say the doom-mongers, the euro will split, the union's authority will be fatally undermined and member states could find themselves run by xenophobes and extremists, being wooed back into the fold by a wounded but competitive Russia.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/personal-view/4929362/Europe-sees-trouble-rising-in-the-East.html