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People cast their votes during general election in Utena, Lithuania October 13, 2024.
Lithuanians want change but shun populists
Lithuanians voted in the first round of general elections on Sunday, where they look likely to empower a center-left coalition and reject far-right populists. The small Baltic state has enjoyed economic growth and low inflation — a rarity these days. Still, the ruling center-right coalition has been criticized for its handling of Russian and Belarusian migrants, as well as health care access.
The opposition Social Democrats are promising to raise taxes on the wealthy and build a stronger social support net. They look likely to pull together like-minded parties to secure a majority, according to recent polling. No single party is expected to earn more than 20% of the seats, but the exact makeup in parliament will be decided in run-offs on Oct. 27. Whoever comes out on top, Lithuania’s strong support for Ukraine and efforts to bolster its own military are points of broad mutual agreement.
Far-right populist parties have had strong showings in Europe this year, surging in elections in Austria, France, Germany, and the Netherlands. Lithuania has its homegrown variety, the Nemunas Dawn party, whose leader is on trial for allegedly inciting hatred with antisemitic remarks. Other parties have promised to sideline the far right in Lithuania, a tactic that has kept the populists out of power elsewhere.
Can Zelensky's 'victory plan' bring peace to Ukraine?
Carl Bildt, former prime minister of Sweden and co-chair of the European Council on Foreign Relations, shares his perspective on European politics from Stockholm, Sweden.
First question, is Zelensky's finalized 'victory plan' realistic to bring peace to Ukraine?
Well, the peace plan that he's talking about is a proposal that he's going to present to President Biden at the meeting in UN in the next few days. They are there for the UN General Assembly, and it consists essentially of beefing up Ukraine's military capabilities with the possibility to use more long-range weapons and other things in order to substantially increase the military difficulties that Russia already having. Thus, possibly, hopefully, making it certain, making it clear to the Kremlin that there's no way to victory and that they have to sit down and agree to something that is acceptable and that can be called peace of some sort. Will this work? Remains to be seen, to put it in the mildest possible way.
Second question, why is there backlash against EU's anti-deforestation law?
Well, it's not unique for that particular one. I mean, all of the legislation for the so-called Green Deal that was decided due to the last five years, a lot of it is fairly complicated and has significant burdens on industry in order to reporting requirements and all of those. That includes the deforestation law. So there is a push to say, "Well, well it's all good. But let's delay it somewhat so that business has the possibility of catching up with all of the requirements." You will see that debate about several aspects of the Green Deal. It doesn't endanger the deal itself, but it perhaps streamlines and perhaps delays it somewhat.
European Commission President Ursula Von der Leyen.
Europe’s Commish chooses her team
European Commission President Ursula Von der Leyen on Tuesday named the team that will work with her as she heads into her second term as the EU’s most powerful official.
What’s the Commission? It’s 27 officials, one from each member state, who propose and oversee EU laws. Think immigration, antitrust, trade, and tech regulation. A key responsibility is drafting the EU budget.
Foreign and defense portfolios went to arch-Russia hawks from the Baltics, while Spain, Italy, and France – which generally favor more state economic intervention – got industrial policy and competition-related files. The choice of a hard-right politician from Italy raised hackles on the left, but it’s part of Von der Leyen’s strategy of engaging the right, in particular Italian PM Giorgia Meloni, to head off a wider populist backlash.
She also nearly reached her goal of gender parity, noting that some member states failed to follow the protocol of nominating one female and one male candidate for each post.
“She’s lining up all her ducks,” says Eurasia Group expert Emre Peker. The big task? Implementing the new $800 billion annual do-or-die economic reform proposals of former ECB president Mario Draghi. “That money isn’t going to materialize out of thin air,” says Peker. It will have to come either from debt issuance, unpopular with the union’s fiscal hawks, or by taking money from popular economic support programs. Either option will be a bruising political fight.
Europe adopts first “binding” treaty on AI
The Council of Europe officially opened its new artificial intelligence treaty for signatories on Sept. 5. The Council is billing its treaty – called the Framework Convention on Artificial Intelligence and Human Rights, Democracy, and the Rule of Law – as the “first-ever international legally binding treaty” aimed at making sure AI systems are consistent with international legal standards.
The US, UK, Vatican, Israel, and the European Union have already signed the framework. While the Council of Europe is a separate body that predates the EU, its treaty comes months after the EU passed its AI Act. The treaty has some similarities with the AI Act, including a common definition of AI, but it is functionally different.
Mina Narayanan, a research analyst at Georgetown University’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology, expressed skepticism about the new treaty’s effectiveness. She said the treaty is “light on details and reiterates provisions that have already been discussed in international fora.” That said, she found the treaty’s attempts to give some legal recourse for harm done by AI systems — including mechanisms to lodge complaints and contest decisions made by AI — somewhat novel.
But Nick Reiners, a senior geo-technology analyst at Eurasia Group, said the treaty isn’t especially binding, despite how it’s billed, since it requires parties to opt in. That’s a measure, he noted, that the UK and US lobbied for as they wanted a “lighter-touch approach.” Further, he said that carveouts from the treaty water down how strenuous it is, particularly regarding AI use for national security purposes. That makes Israel’s willingness to participate unsurprising since the treaty wouldn’t cover how it’s deploying AI in the war in Gaza.
Reiners said that despite its lack of involvement in creating this treaty, the EU would like to use it to “internationalize the AI Act,” getting companies and governments outside the continent in line with its priorities on AI.
While the treaty isn’t groundbreaking, “it shows how the Western world, in a broader sense, is continuing to expand the international rules-based framework that underpins the respect of human rights and the rule of law,” he said, “and this framework now takes account of AI.”
Asylum seekers wait outside the foreign office in Brussels, Belgium.
Crackdowns against asylum-seekers gain momentum in Europe and the Americas
On both sides of the Atlantic, a range of countries adopted new measures to clamp down on asylum-seekers this week, amid rising concern about the political impacts of immigration.
Panama began US-funded deportation flights as part of an agreement with Washington to stem the flow of hundreds of thousands of people who transit the country annually en route to the US border. Immigration is the number-two top issue for US voters right now.
Brazil announced it will crack down on layovers who request asylum, after finding that many of them simply use refuge in Brazil as a jumping-off point for northward journeys to the US or Canada.
Hanging over all of this: Some 40% of Venezuelans say they may leave the country if Nicolas Maduro remains in power. Their exodus would exacerbate what is already the world’s largest external refugee crisis.
Across the pond, the UK, reeling from recent anti-immigrant violence, pledged a raft of new measures to stop asylum-seekers from coming, staying, or working in the country. Immigration is now the top issue for UK voters — the first time since the European immigration crisis of 2016, which helped fuel Brexit.
And Hungarian PM Viktor Orban took a page from Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s book, promising one-way tickets to Brussels for undocumented migrants who arrive in Hungary. The threat comes after the EU fined Budapest for a strict border policy that is out of step with common EU rules.
Ukraine's Kursk invasion complicates Putin's war efforts
Carl Bildt, former prime minister of Sweden and co-chair of the European Council on Foreign Relations, shares his perspective on European politics from Tabiano Castello in Italy.
How will the Ukraine Kursk incursion affect Putin's way of handling his war?
No question. It does complicate things for him quite considerably. First, they were trying to say, "Well, this is a quick thing. This will be over. The mighty Russian army is going to throw out the evil Ukrainians within a short period of time." That has clearly not been successful. So, now they're trying to say, "Well, this is not a big thing." They're trying to play it down. But whatever. It does complicate significantly the narrative that Putin has been trying to hand out, some say, or get anchored with the Russians that victory is going to come. It's only question of patience. He will have quite considerable difficulty. More on the political way. In the political respect than in the military with this operation.
What do we expect of Indian Prime Minister Modi's visit to Kyiv in the coming days?
I think it's going to be interesting to see. I would be interesting to see whether he hugs, embraces Zelensky in the way he did in a way that was quite remarkable with Putin when he was in Moscow a couple of weeks ago. And I think that sort of hugging of Putin did create some image problem for India in part of the word, notably in the West. And it will be interesting to see how far he goes in his visit to Kyiv in sort of counterbalancing the impression created by that hugging of Putin in the Kremlin.
Ukraine's capture of POWs undermines Russia's narrative
Carl Bildt, former prime minister of Sweden and co-chair of the European Council on Foreign Relations, shares his perspective on European politics from the Adriatic Sea.
How might Ukraine's capture of Russian prisoners of war affect the narrative of the war?
I don't think it's going to have any immediate effect on the narrative of the war. The big shift in the narrative is, of course, that while the Russian Putin has been saying that Ukraine is about to lose this particular war week by week, day by day, village by village, that's been turned around and very much the outcome of the war is now more open, where Ukraine has demonstrated a substantial offensive capability as well. That's the change.
How do the lithium protests in Serbia reflect the wider tensions in the country?
Well, they certainly do. I mean, first it has to be said with large-scale mining project, there are always environmental concerns and there have been other mining projects in Serbia, Chinese with the Bor copper mine, where that has not been the case. So there are concerns. That being said, the protests are also fueled by the fact that there is substantial democracy and transparency deficit in Serbia. So under other circumstances, this would've been a more normal environmental concern protest. Now it's a much wider issue, reflecting tensions in Serbia's society.
Police Officers walk past a burnt out police vehicle as they are deployed on the streets of Hartlepool following a violent protest.
Starmer responds to misinformation-fueled protests across Britain
The UK’s new Prime Minister Keir Starmer convened an emergency Cobra committee meeting on Monday to address the anti-immigrant and far-right riots that have spread across England and Northern Ireland following the killing of three young girls last week.
In a major early test of his leadership, Starmer said he is establishing a “standing army” of specialized police officers and allocating more resources to the courts to handle the increased caseload related to the riots.
Starmer also said anyone inciting violence online could face legal consequences and called on social media companies to do more to crack down on extremism. He criticized Elon Musk’s amplification of inflammatory far-right posts about the riots, including one in which the billionaire wrote that “civil war is inevitable” under a video of the chaos.
Why are they rioting? After three girls were stabbed at a Taylor Swift-inspired dance class last Monday – 10 others were also injured – the suspect was inaccurately identified online as a Muslim asylum-seeker who had arrived in the UK by boat, spurring rioters to take to the streets shouting anti-immigrant and Islamophobic slogans. Over the weekend, mosques were attacked, cars were set ablaze, police officers were attacked and injured, and hundreds of rioters attempted to set a hotel housing asylum-seekers on fire.
Although Starmer’s Labour Party secured a significant majority over the Conservatives last month, the win did not erase the rise of right-wing populism in Britain. Eurasia Group’s Europe Managing Director Mujtaba Rahman says that beyond his immediate response, Starmer will “need to address the concerns over illegal immigration that have seen the rise of populism across Europe, including in the UK, and have been used by the lawless hard right to foment discord last week and this weekend.”