Monday 7 June 2021

POLITICO

POLITICO

Biden’s foreign policy: Reverse the Trump agenda but hit one similar note

Posted: 07 Jun 2021 04:02 AM PDT

Joe Biden has always fashioned himself a foreign policy wonk.

As a senator, he was a longtime member — and eventually leader — of the Foreign Relations committee. As a presidential candidate in 2008, he focused his campaign on his ability to handle tough international entanglements, chief among them the Iraq war. And as vice president, he tackled a variety of foreign policy issues, from Central America to Eastern Europe.

But now that Biden is president after nearly five decades in public office, his foreign policy agenda has been largely overshadowed by enormous domestic crises at home. And so, as he embarks on his first foreign trip this week, Biden will attempt to fuse the two — emphasizing that the steps he as president takes on the international stage will have a direct impact for average Americans back home, according to eight current and former aides, colleagues and foreign policy experts.https://05f1e6b1c081dfc21d4830a74a57a674.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html

Think of it as a more global-minded, multilateralist take on America First. It's not a completely new concept for Biden. But it's made all the more critical as he continues to push for trillions of dollars in spending and tries to maintain his grip on the portion of working-class voters who helped him win in 2020. His early tenure has been defined not by wars and foreign entanglements but the coronavirus pandemic and economic downturn that spawned from it, forcing him to put his first love — foreign policy — on the backburner.

"He not only enjoys it but he understands it. He’s studied it. And it’s something that is very much part of who he is, because he’s always seen foreign policy not as separate from domestic policy or the interest of the United States," said Chuck Hagel, a friend who served alongside Biden in the Senate and the Obama administration as secretary of defense. "He’s always seen foreign policy as part of the overall interest process of our country, whether it’s international trade or environment, terrorism, defense … all of those things are part of our own interests."

But American voters aren't Biden's only audience. He leaves on an eight-day trip to Europe Wednesday amid enormous scrutiny from world leaders eager to see how he will approach international issues as president in part because of the lack of emphasis on it during his first four-and-half months in office.

Biden will attend a Group of Seven gathering of world leaders in Cornwall, England to discuss a host of issues, including trade, taxes and Covid. He will then confer with NATO and European Union leaders in Brussels about security in the face of challenges from Russia and China. His final stop will be in Geneva, where he will meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin as part of a bilateral talk — a meeting for which Biden has already received criticism due to continued cyber aggressions from Russia into the United States.

Biden invited Putin to meet, even though that talk appears unlikely to reap any immediate benefits. Still, the White House says Biden wanted to meet with Putin to press him directly on cyberattacks and human rights as well as speak about areas where they may have common ground, including nuclear arms control and climate change. Biden aides say even though the meeting isn't likely to lead to any major policy agreements, the president wanted to take the first step to establishing the relationship.

Biden's record on the international stage has, at times, been a real vulnerability, most notably because of his support for the invasion of Iraq in 2002. In office, he has struck some similar notes as his predecessor, Donald Trump — including support for a firm withdrawal from Afghanistan. Still, during his upcoming trip, he will try to portray his vision as the opposite of Trump's America First foreign policy that dramatically disrupted long-standing alliances and actively undermined the U.S.’s leadership role.

Yet much has changed in the four years of the Trump presidency at home and abroad. The populism that fueled Trump's rise has ricocheted around the globe. China has secured its place as the U.S.'s dominant economic rival. And other countries, primarily European allies, including Britain, France and Germany, have attempted to fill the void the U.S. left in holding Iran's nuclear ambitions in check and combating climate change, among other issues.

In effect, Biden will have to balance the desire to emphasize domestic priorities at a time when America's global preeminence seems threatened like never before. He previewed the approach he'd take in remarks to the State Department in February, when he bluntly stated that "there's no longer a bright line between foreign and domestic policy," adding, "Every action we take in our conduct abroad, we must take with American working families in mind." He expanded upon it in an op-ed he wrote in the Washington Post this weekend ahead of his trip.

"[A]s America's economic recovery helps to propel the global economy," he wrote, "we will be stronger and more capable when we are flanked by nations that share our values and our vision for the future — by other democracies."

Throughout the trip, Biden will stress that his foreign policies will strengthen his domestic policies, especially on the economy, marrying the two in a way other recent presidents, including Barack Obama, failed in marrying the two.

"It really seems pretty clear that he sees his main agenda is a domestic one," said a former aide to Biden on foreign policy. "And to me, his foreign policy moves, in terms of the personnel and the investments, have reflected that."

Some critics and foreign policy experts have questioned whether that's practical given the scope of conflicts that he will face — everything from fighting in the Middle East to territorial disputes in the South China Sea. And they question whether Biden is just trying to do the minimum on foreign policy.

"There’s definitely a desire to put foreign policy on the back burner, and really kind of hammer on the domestic issues. I think they feel like they have a window for a really transformative domestic agenda," said James Carafano, a former Trump foreign policy adviser who serves as director of the center for foreign policy at the conservative Heritage Foundation. "It’s generally what I would call risk averse, which is, the less we do, you know, the less problems we’ll have, and to really kind of do the minimum path necessary. And then, if that doesn’t work, maybe we’ll do a little more."

Biden allies say he's hardly doing the minimum on foreign policy. Instead, he's recognizing how interconnected it is with domestic concerns. The president and his aides have tried to stress that connection every chance they get on climate and trade, the economy and Covid. Last week, when Biden announced the U.S. will donate 25 million doses of surplus vaccine overseas he immediately said it would help keep still vulnerable Americans safe.

Even on the largest scale of foreign policy initiatives — the need to support democratic governance — Biden world has tied it squarely to domestic considerations.

"He rightly says we're in a competition between democracies and autocracies, and that in order to win that competition, democracies like ours need to demonstrate they can still deliver for the people — above all those who were left behind," said Ivo Daalder, a former U.S. ambassador to NATO who now serves as president of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. "That's why his domestic focus isn't only about Americans, it's also about winning the global competition with autocracies like China."

Ash Jain, who worked in the State Department under President George W. Bush, and is now a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, said Biden will endeavor to show that global alliances "matter to ordinary Americans and that they benefit from this notion of a foreign policy for the middle class."

"I would expect to see him highlight how the G-7 can help with issues like COVID recovery, the economic recovery efforts, climate and other things on the minds of everyday Americans," he said.

Nowhere is that more pronounced than on economic issues. Biden, who built his political brand on being from a working class family from Scranton, Pa., has talked repeatedly about how his jobs agenda and climate initiatives are directly needed to combat China's economic ascendance.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said every foreign policy action will have a direct line to the economy. "We've set the foreign policy priorities for the Biden administration, by asking a few simple questions: What will our foreign policy mean for American workers and their families? What do we need to do around the world to make us stronger here at home? And what do we need to do at home to make us stronger in the world?" Blinken said in his first major speech in March.

Biden has been pushing Republicans to support a combined $4 trillion in spending a once-in-a-generation investment in infrastructure and social programs designed to ignite economic recovery and enhance America's social safety net. But Republicans have been resistant to the size and scope of Biden's proposals, which include tax hikes on corporate and wealthy Americans.

This weekend, G-7 countries reached an agreement to make it more difficult for the world's largest companies to avoid paying taxes by setting a minimum 15 percent global corporate tax threshold.

Tellingly, the administration quickly touted the domestic benefit that would accrue from it.

Speaking at a news conference Saturday, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said, "That global minimum tax would end the race-to-the-bottom in corporate taxation and ensure fairness for the middle class and working people in the U.S. and around the world."

Ukraine’s Euro 2020 football kit angers Russia

Posted: 07 Jun 2021 03:27 AM PDT

The unveiling of Ukraine’s kit for the 2020 European Football Championship belatedly starting this week has caused an angry response from Russia due to its depiction of of the country’s borders not excluding Russian-annexed Crimea.

The shirt displays a map of Ukraine including Crimea, which was annexed by Russia in 2014, and Donetsk and Lugansk, both controlled by pro-Russian separatists. The slogan “Glory to Ukraine!” on the back is known for having been popular during the demonstrations that ousted pro-Russian president Viktor Yanukovych in 2014.

“The Ukrainian football team, in its uniform, annexed the territory of Ukraine to the Russian Crimea,” Russia’s Foreign Affairs Department Press Director Maria Zakharova said, adding that the slogan is “a copy of the famous German National Socialist greetings.” Russian MPs have called the kit “totally inappropriate” and a “political provocation,” according to the BBC.

Andrii Pavelko, the president of the Ukrainian Association of Football, who on Sunday posted pictures of the kit on Facebook, said that he believes “Ukraine’s silhouette will give strength to the players because they will fight for all of Ukraine.”

“The shirt of the Ukrainian national team (and of all other teams) for Uefa Euro 2020 has been approved by Uefa, in accordance with the applicable equipment regulations,” the European football governing body said in a statement to the BBC.

EU to UK on Northern Ireland disruption: You saw it coming

Posted: 07 Jun 2021 01:21 AM PDT

EU politicians have taken aim at U.K. Brexit Minister David Frost over an opinion article in which he admitted his government “underestimated” the effects of the Northern Ireland protocol and argued the bloc needs a “new playbook for dealing with neighbours” which “involves pragmatic solutions between friends.”

Ireland’s Foreign Minister Simon Coveney and France’s Secretary of State for European Affairs Clément Beaune both took to Twitter to reject Frost’s characterization of the issues in his Financial Times op-ed, published Sunday.

“Lord Frost continues to lay blame for difficulty with Protocol at EU inflexibility. This is simply not the case,” Coveney said. In his tweet, Beaune noted “the Northern Ireland protocol cannot be called into question. It’s not the problem, it’s the solution to a problem that we have not created.”

The European side also hit out at Frost’s admission that his government had not foreseen some of the consequences of the Northern Ireland protocol. "We underestimated the effect of the protocol on goods movements to Northern Ireland, with some suppliers in Great Britain simply not sending their products because of the time-consuming paperwork required,” Frost wrote. “We've seen manufacturers of medicines cutting supply.”

Journalists pointed out that internal government documents spelled out the dire customs scenarios, while Ireland’s Minister of State for European Affairs Thomas Byrne said: “The British Government's own 2019 explainer on the NI protocol explains the protocol pretty accurately.”

Frost’s opinion piece for the Financial Times was published ahead of a meeting this week with his EU counterpart Maroš Šefčovič in London for the first U.K.-EU Partnership Council, as the clock ticks down on grace periods for imposing checks on animal and plant products, something that risks grave disruption, Frost argued.

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Europe’s latest export: A bad disinformation strategy

Posted: 06 Jun 2021 07:01 PM PDT

Peter Cunliffe-Jones is a visiting researcher at the University of Westminster and the Founder of Africa Check. 

When it comes to tech regulation, what happens in Europe doesn't usually stay in Europe. Legislation cooked up in Brussels has a way of becoming a de facto standard for governments around the world looking for off-the-shelf solutions to the challenges of the digital age. 

With the European Union's landmark proposal on fighting misinformation — the Digital Services Act (DSA) and its accompanying Code of Practice on disinformation — that's bad news. The approach embraced by Brussels simply doesn't work, in Europe or anywhere else. Not only does it fail to address the harm from misinformation, our research suggests it risks doing real damage of its own. 

The poster child of the EU's tech heft is its data privacy law, the General Data Protection Regulation. "Since the adoption of the GDPR, we have seen the beginning of a race to the top for the adoption or upgrade of data protection laws around the world," according to Estelle Massé, a policy analyst with digital rights campaigners Access Now. 

The Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA), which came into effect in South Africa in 2020, is often compared to GDPR and is expected to be brought more closely into line with it over time. Kenya's data privacy law is also "largely modelled on" the EU regulations, (though not enough for its critics), analysts say.

That's great in the case of the GDPR, where the model is broadly a good one. It would terrible if the same thing were to happen with the DSA and the Code of Practice.

Our research into the way misinformation causes harm suggests the two will fail to achieve one of their main goals: reducing the negative effects of misinformation. 

Complex legislation though it is, the DSA's approach is a simple one. It boils down to ordering tech companies to promptly remove "illegal content" once it has been identified or signaled to them, or face major fines if they don't.  

The accompanying Code, first introduced in 2018 and now being updated applies the same principle to misinformation: requiring companies to either remove or demote content deemed false and accounts that promote it. 

The problems with the DSA, the Code of Practice, and similar models for tackling misinformation and disinformation are threefold:  

First is the responsibility or license the laws give to privately-owned tech companies to decide, behind closed doors, what constitutes harmful content. Few object to takedowns of child pornography, terrorism-related material or hate speech. But all of those are quite well-defined. What counts as misinformation or disinformation is not, and working out what is harmful is harder still.

Second, even if the tech firms do identify harmful misinformation in way the public would agree with, simply forcing them to take it down after the fact does not reverse the harm caused, like other more proactive approaches, such as teaching misinformation literacy and fact-checking can.

Third, while the DSA and the Code are presented as a solution to harmful misinformation, it offers no answers to the wider problems of the information disorder (a technical term for the witting or unwitting sharing of falsehoods). As Christine Czerniak, technical lead of the World Health Organisation's team fighting Covid-19 information disorder, said the "infodemic" is "a lot more than misinformation or disinformation." She added she was speaking in general terms, not specifically in relation to the DSA or other proposals.

Any approach to disinformation must address why people are sharing it in the first place. 

In addition to not working, the takedown approach can itself do actual harm. Czerniak noted that it has the potential to escalate polarization or making it hard for public health teams to hear people's concerns and respond to them. 

Bad laws intended to halt disinformation can be used to limit public debate. When we examined the laws of 11 African countries, we found that the numbers of laws targeting "false" information doubled between 2016 and 2020, spurred by and using the language of the crackdowns in Europe and elsewhere.  

The laws provided vague or no definitions of what counts as "false," or how "harm" should be proven, but put in place heavy fines or jail time for those who transgress. Unsurprisingly, most of those punished under these new laws have been political opponents and journalists.

If the EU wants to get serious about tackling harmful misinformation, at home or abroad, our research suggests it would need to take a different approach.  

First, the EU and national governments should agree to a transparent approach to content moderation, with common definitions and standards of evidence, and a preference for correcting misinformation rather than simply censoring it. 

Second, European education systems need to rethink their approach to teaching media literacy. The sort of broad media literacy taught today across much of Europe is not as effective at reducing susceptibility to false information as misinformation literacy — media literacy focused on specific misinformation knowledge and skills.  

Third, national governments need to take measure to counter false claims by domestic politicians in their official capacities, one of the most dangerous forms of disinformation. The EU cannot mandate practices in national parliaments, but the European Parliament could show a lead — requiring MEPS and officials to correct misleading statements they make in parliament. This is not so outlandish. It is required of ministers in the UK, for example. 

Finally, the best way to counter misinformation is with information. When it comes to topics that are particularly vulnerable to misinformation, it is crucial that official sources provide citizens with a place they can find the real facts. 

If the EU were to put in place a measured, effective approach to fighting misinformation, it would have the potential to do a lot of good for the world. 

France plots an EU presidency en français, s’il vous plaît

Posted: 06 Jun 2021 07:00 PM PDT

Forget Euro English. Forget Globish. France is determined to make 2022 the year of the French language. 

Ah, je m'excuse : l'année de la langue française

Seven months before taking over the EU's rotating Council presidency, the French government is mulling plans to revive the declining use and visibility of la langue de Molière. 

The French government is earmarking money to offer more French classes to EU civil servants. Officials are contemplating hosting French-language debates featuring the country's crème de la crème.

And then there are the meetings. 

During the country's presidency, French diplomats said all key meetings of the Council of the EU will be conducted in French (with translations available). Notes and minutes will be French-first. Even preparatory meetings will be conducted in French. 

If a letter arrives from the European Commission in English, it will go unanswered — Le français est nécessaire. 

French, of course, is an official EU language (one of 24), and one of the three working languages of the Europen Commission. And France has used its EU presidency to promote the French language before. But French officials admit that in 2022, reviving French, which used to be the lingua franca of the EU, is a matter of cultural survival for all. They claim pushing French is a way to stall the creep of "Globish" — English suffused with non-native eccentricities — in favor of vibrant multilingualism. But to some eye-rolling diplomats, it's just an illustration of French haughtiness and nostalgia for the time when French was la langue préférée of diplomats.

“Even if we admit that English is a working language and it is commonly practiced, the basis to express oneself in French remains fully in place in the EU institutions,” said a senior French diplomat. “We must enrich it, and make it live again so that the French language truly regains ground, and above that, the taste and pride of multilingualism.

“There will be more visibility with the French presidency, so we will intensify our work,” the diplomat added.

Back home, France's Francophone push echoes a domestic debate over the country’s role in the world. Since 2018, French President Emmanuel Macron has been working to boost the French language worldwide — supporting Francophone projects in Africa, for instance. And with an election around the corner in 2022, Macron is also fending off a far-right presidential rival, Marine Le Pen, who pitches herself as a preserver of the French way of life.

Parlez-vous français?

France is far from the only EU country that has chosen to conduct Council meetings in a native language. 

But the practice has become far less prominent in recent years, with many countries — particularly smaller ones — switching to English to save time and better ensure they're widely understood. 

As an example, Nuno Brito, the Portuguese ambassador whose country currently holds the EU presidency, speaks mostly in English in Council meetings, several Council officials said.

But as is often the case, the French like to do it the French way. 

Already, French diplomats traditionally speak French at their regular meeting of EU ambassadors, a gathering known as the "Coreper," regardless of whether their country holds the presidency. 

And once France does assume the presidency, French diplomats said they will expand their use of French to all key meetings in the Council, including "all the presidency notes, the Coreper working groups and whatever allows us to organize all the work in the Council," the French diplomat said, referring to the Council presidency notes, which are ultimately available in all of the EU's official languages.

Even the "Antici" and "Mertens" groups, which are aimed at preparing ambassadors’ meetings, will be conducted in French.   

“We want rules to be respected,” the diplomat said. “Thus, we will always ask the Commission to send us in French the letters it wishes to address to the French authorities, and if they fail to do so, we will wait for the French version before sending it.”

But the push goes beyond standing on principle and enforcing increasingly ignored protocols. 

France is investing “exceptional budgetary and educational means" to step up the number of French classes for EU civil servants, the diplomat said, particularly through the “Alliance Française Bruxelles-Europe," the main French language school in Brussels. Officials at the Alliance Française did not respond to a request to confirm an increase in French classes.

And within the EU itself, France will fully deploy an official overseeing the "French presence in the European Institutions." Natacha Ficarelli, a former professor and expert on European affairs was recently hired to helm these efforts.

France will also offer French-language debates during its presidency, inviting speakers from Paris up to Brussels, the French diplomat said. 

"This is where we, as French, are appealing," he said.

The moment could similarly augur a Brussels resurgence for French-speaking ambassadors from any country. The GFA-B — which stands for "Group of Francophone Ambassadors in Brussels" — is a collection of 19 disparate EU ambassadors who share at least one trait: They speak French. 

Led by Luminiţa Odobescu, Romania’s permanent representative in Brussels, the group held its first meeting last month. They discussed — en Français, bien sûr — the EU's foreign policy priorities, according to a spokesperson from Odobescu's office.

Hoping for a comeback

Given that French is one of the Commission's three working languages, as well as one of the Council's two spoken languages, it still holds a prominent position within the EU. 

With 3,246 French nationals working at the European Commission, France is the third most represented country after Italy and Belgium. And according to the Commission, almost 80 percent of Commission officials as of 2020 spoke French as a first, second or third language. 

In 2021 alone, there have been 143,099 pages of laws, web content, letters and press releases translated into French as the EU grinds through its daily business.

But French has long been losing ground to English as the EU's main working language, especially since the EU started expanding east and north. The surge of expansion in 2004 — which saw 10 mostly Central and Eastern European countries join the EU — was a particular inflection point. 

The use of Euro English and Globish has become so widespread that several institutions have made behind-the-scenes efforts to streamline costs or improve efficiency by either prioritizing an English-only format or adding English to meetings where French was once used exclusively. 

French officials note that with Britain gone from the EU, there are only two, fairly small, EU members — Ireland and Malta — that use English as an official language. And they use it alongside Irish and Maltese. For everybody else, English is, at best, a second language.

For the French, pushing their native tongue in Brussels is about more than diplomacy — it also carries a domestic political component. Officials in Paris are selling their EU French-language efforts to a French audience as well.  

In an April op-ed published in Le Figaro, two French ministers — EU Affairs Minister Clément Beaune and Secretary of State Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne, who oversees tourism and “Francophonie” — said France's EU presidency created "an opportunity to hold high this vital fight for multilingualism." 

They admitted that the use of the French language in the EU “had diminished to the benefit of English, and more often to Globish, that ersatz of the English language which narrows the scope of one’s thoughts, and restricts one’s ability to express him or herself more than it makes it easier.” 

In the piece, Beaune and Lemoyne announced the creation of a cross-partisan “Working Group on the French-speaking world and multilingualism," a hodge-podge of 16 French-speaking former Commission officials, journalists, diplomats like Odobescu and MEPs like Sandro Gozi, an Italian member of the centrist Renew Europe group. 

The group is due to issue a report in September with proposals on how to revive the French language during the French presidency. It has already held regular sessions, during which members have examined how EU texts are translated, how the EU communicates to outsiders, how the EU designs its "linguistic criteria in recruitment and how "language trainings" are conducted in EU countries, said Christian Lequesne, head of the working group and a senior European politics professor at the elite Sciences Po institute in Paris.

"One of the goals will be to encourage the teaching of two foreign languages, in addition to one’s native language," Lequesne said. "The exercise we are leading now is done with the goal of preserving the future of the French language in Brussels. But not only, it is also the defense of multilingualism."

Inevitably, France’s insistence on using French will grate on many in the EU. Eastern European diplomats are especially irked, as they often don't speak French, but do speak English regularly.

"It could be divisive," one of these diplomats said. "Some are afraid that they could miss something, because also their French is not that good.”

The diplomat added: "We are so used to English."

Germany’s Christian Democrats dominate in key state election ahead of national vote

Posted: 06 Jun 2021 12:59 PM PDT

BERLIN — Germany's ruling Christian Democrats scored a commanding victory in a closely watched regional election on Sunday, handing the conservative bloc a crucial boost in the final test before September's general election. 

The center-right Christian Democrats (CDU) won 37.1 percent of the vote in Sunday's state election in Saxony-Anhalt, according to preliminary results, relegating the far-right Alternative for Germany party (AfD) to a distant second with 20.8 percent. 

That means that CDU is all but certain to retain control of the state in coalition with smaller parties. 

The win will likely squash fears that the CDU is vulnerable on its right flank in the wake of a caustic battle for the chancellor candidacy in April that some feared would divide the conservative bloc in the run-up to September’s election. It also provided a substantial boost to the CDU's new leader, Armin Laschet, who is running to succeed Angela Merkel and extend his party’s 16-year hold on power.

The CDU has slipped in national polls in recent months as many voters flirted with the idea of voting for the Greens. The ecological party has pulled even with the CDU and its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU), in many polls, suggesting that it has a chance of leading Germany's next government. The CDU is also under attack from the AfD, especially in former East German states, where the xenophobic party is especially strong. 

An eastern state with fewer than 2 million voters, Saxony-Anhalt doesn't normally have much impact on Germany's national politics. But this year, the timing of the state's election made it something of a bellwether, as it marked the last time Germans will go to the polls before selecting a new federal government and a successor to Merkel on September 26.

In the run-up to election day, the AfD was neck and neck with the CDU in many polls, raising the possibility that the anti-immigrant party might win its first state. 

Instead, that prospect appears to have driven voters to back incumbent state premier Reiner Haseloff of the CDU. Haseloff, who has governed the state since 2011, recorded his strongest result yet on Sunday.

"I'm grateful to all of our citizens that a really substantial majority chose democracy and drew a line between us and the right, preserving our image as democrats," Haseloff said in an interview with German public television. 

Most observers attributed the CDU's win to Haseloff's personal popularity. Even so, the victory was also good news for Laschet, who campaigned for Haseloff in the state even though the state premier had supported Laschet’s rival, Bavarian leader Markus Söder, in the race to become the conservative bloc’s candidate for chancellor. 

A CDU defeat in Saxony-Anhalt at the hands of the AfD would have been an unmitigated disaster for Laschet and renewed questions about his suitability as a candidate to lead the country. 

Although the AfD, which in Saxony-Anhalt has a reputation for particularly extremist views, still won about a fifth of the vote — roughly double the roughly 10 percent the party receives in national polls — the result was below what the party received in the last election in 2016, with a loss of 3.4 percentage points.

Left-wing parties struggle

Even as the CDU managed to capitalize on concerns that the AfD would put in a strong showing, parties to the left of the political spectrum had a tougher time. 

The Greens, which are traditionally weak in eastern states, won 5.9 percent of the vote, marginally better than the 5.2 percent they recorded in the last election in 2016. 

The Social Democrats (SPD), who have struggled across Germany in recent years, fared even worse, falling below the 10 percent threshold to 8.4 percent, a drop of 2.2 percentage points. The same was true of the leftist Die Linke, the successor to the East German communist party, which won just 11 percent after garnering more than 16 percent five years ago. 

The Free Democrats (FDP), a conservative liberal party, won 6.4 percent, an increase of 1.6 percentage points over 2016. 

That raises the possibility that the CDU could drop the Greens to forge a coalition with the SPD and FDP, the traditional partner of the center right. 

This article has been updated.

With trust ‘low,’ EU, UK spar ahead of post-Brexit talks

Posted: 06 Jun 2021 10:17 AM PDT

The EU’s ambassador to the U.K. on Sunday conceded there was little trust between the two sides ahead of a meeting this week to discuss contentious trade barriers with Northern Ireland.

Indeed, as if on cue, U.K. Brexit Minister David Frost published an op-ed Sunday afternoon in the Financial Times calling on the EU to revise those barriers, known as the Northern Ireland protocol — a plea the EU has previously resisted.

“The levels of trust are low right now,” EU Ambassador João Vale de Almeida told Times Radio. “We ultimately need to re-establish a minimum level of trust that allows us to find solutions. But, this being said … I remain confident that we can get there.”

After months of intense technical negotiations, hopes are slim for a breakthrough at the key meeting happening on Wednesday between European Commission Vice President Maroš Šefčovič and Frost. Both will discuss the Brexit divorce deal, including the Northern Ireland protocol.

The protocol is a key part of the Brexit agreement, aiming to protect the EU's single market at its frontier with the U.K. in Ireland. Under the agreement, Northern Ireland has stayed within the EU's single market when it comes to goods. But customs border checks on goods crossing the Irish sea have still led to disruptions on goods movements, angering unionists and loyalists, who don't want the region to feel separated from the rest of the U.K.

While some in Northern Ireland have pushed to simply scrap the protocol, Frost on Sunday laid out an argument for revising the agreement instead.

"The balance we hoped for has not been found,” Frost said. “We underestimated the effect of the protocol on goods movements to Northern Ireland, with some suppliers in Great Britain simply not sending their products because of the time-consuming paperwork required.

"The EU needs a new playbook for dealing with neighbors, one that involves pragmatic solutions between friends, not the imposition of one side's rules on the other and legal purism," he added.

Irish Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney issued a stark warning on Friday as he met with Frost, saying European patience was wearing thin over Britain's obstruction of the Northern Ireland protocol agreement, as several EU officials said the U.K. was rebuffing options.

Of nearly 30 points of dispute identified in U.K.-EU Joint Committee talks that began in April, only a few have been even partially resolved.

The EU also wants "more engagement" from the U.K., Vale de Almeida recently said in an interview with POLITICO.

Cristina Gallardo contributed reporting.

UK’s June 21 reopening in doubt amid new COVID spread

Posted: 06 Jun 2021 04:14 AM PDT

The spread of an infectious COVID-19 variant in Britain has cast doubt on whether the country will go through with its plan to fully repeal its pandemic restrictions on June 21.

The so-called Delta variant, which appears to spread more rapidly than previous U.K. variants, is now the dominant COVID strain in Britain, fueling a surge in cases.

In response, British officials are drawing up contingency plans to postpone the final phase of easing, possibly to July 5, according to the Financial Times and the Telegraph. A two-week delay would allow more adults to be fully vaccinated and resistant to the rapid spread of the variant, first identified in India.

British Health Minister Matt Hancock on Sunday conceded it was too early to say whether the government would stick to its plan to scrap masks and social distancing.  

“It’s too early to make a final decision on that,” he said, adding that the government was still considering the date of June 21 at this point.

“The prime minister and I and the team will be looking at all the data over this week," Hancock told Sky News.

Addressing the Delta variant specifically, Hancock said on BBC that scientists had estimated the strain’s “growth advantage” was “around 40 percent.”

“That does make life more challenging for everybody,” he added.

Recent Office for National Statistics data suggests COVID infection levels in England rose by about 75 percent during the last week of May. Still, U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson said last week that nothing in the data suggested a reason to derail the plan to end the lockdown, while cautioning that he would move prudently on reopening.

Yet some experts are now strongly urging the government against any further reopening. Independent SAGE, a group of British scientists focused on providing guidance to the government, issued an "emergency statement" last week said stalling the existing plans to lift the last restrictions could help “avoid another full lockdown.”

Despite the rise in cases, the number of COVID-19 deaths in Britain remains relatively low, as three-quarters of U.K. adults have received at least one dose of the vaccine. Just over half of adults are fully inoculated.

According to Sky News, the government would rather tweak pandemic restrictions than push back the reopening date.

If the Delta variant spread does delay Britain’s lockdown easing, it could prove damaging to Johnson. The prime minister has been criticized for moving slowly to bar passengers from India.

This article is part of POLITICO's premium policy service: Pro Health Care. From drug pricing, EMA, vaccines, pharma and more, our specialized journalists keep you on top of the topics driving the health care policy agenda. Email pro@politico.eu for a complimentary trial. 
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