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A member of the Carabinieri gestures towards migrants outside the hotspot, on the Sicilian island of Lampedusa, Italy, September 16, 2023.
Migration makes strange bedfellows of Germany and Italy
German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier said during a visit to Italy that both countries had reached the “limits of [their] capacity” to accommodate migrants, and called for “fair distribution” of the burdens of migration across the European Union.
The background. In just the last week, over 11,000 people have landed on the Italian island of Lampedusa. They’re part of the 127,000 migrants who have landed in Italy in 2023, more than double the number who had arrived by this point in 2022.
Under current EU asylum regulations, migrants are required to apply for asylum in the member state to which they first arrive. Should they, say, leave Italy to try their chances with Germany’s relatively generous system, they’re to be deported back.
But Rome has recently been refusing to accept back asylum-seekers who leave, citing the disproportionate influx. That caused a row with Berlin, which announced last week it would suspend a voluntary agreement to take in 3,500 asylum seekers who had landed in Italy — before suddenly reversing course.
The European Union received over 519,000 asylum requests between January and June, a 28% year-on-year increase and the most since 2016. Germany fielded 30%, about as many as France and Spain combined. That’s not counting over a million Ukrainian refugees whom Germany hosts, far and away the most in Western Europe.
So when Meloni says the rest of the bloc needs to share the burden, it resonates in Berlin. It’s also in the SPD’s interest to be seen taking a more proactive anti-immigration stance, as their conservative rivals have recently revived the idea of a national migrant cap. It’s part of a larger shift on migration politics in Germany, as even SPD’s left-wing allies in the Green party call for tougher migration standards faced with the ascendance of the far-right Alternative fur Deutschland.
Convincing the rest of the bloc to step up will be difficult. Since migration to Europe from Syria spiked in 2015, the EU has struggled to find consensus on bloc-wide immigration policies due to conflicting pressures in the politics of each member state.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.
Meloni to visit the White House
An invitation to the White House is no small feat, and the latest world leader to get one from President Joe Biden is indeed an interesting one: Italian PM Giorgia Meloni.
The two were chatting this week about the situation in Russia and recent developments in North Africa – meaning Europe’s migrant crisis – when Biden asked Meloni to visit the White House next month.
As the leader of a G7 country and a close European ally, it might not seem like such a big deal for Meloni to be hosted by the US president. But as head of the far-right Brothers of Italy Party – which has neo-fascistic roots – Meloni cuts a very interesting cloth in European politics.
Upon coming to office last fall, many analysts suggested that Meloni – under pressure from her extreme coalition partners – might abandon support for Ukraine and strain relations with the US and the UK, particularly as she’d long styled herself as an anti-globalist. Meloni had also railed against the European Union.
But Meloni, a pragmatic and ideological politician, has emerged as a fierce ally of Ukraine, calling for ongoing military aid to Kyiv despite falling support amongst the Italian electorate and pushback within her coalition. (Still, she’s had more fraught relations with fellow EU leaders – particularly France’s Emmanuel Macron – over immigration.)
Biden, for his part, likely wants to give the Italian PM a photo op for toeing the line on Ukraine, while for Meloni, a visit will give her visibility that’ll play well at home, where she remains extremely popular.
Boris Johnson remains a dangerous force in UK politics
Carl Bildt, co-chair of the European Council on Foreign Relations and former prime minister of Sweden, shares his perspective on European politics, this week from the Oslo airport.
Is the political career of Boris Johnson over?
Seems to be the case but you can never be entirely certain, in his particular case. I think he has the ambition to come back. And clearly, he's going to remain a dangerous, in my opinion, a very disruptive force inside the Conservative Party. If they lose the election next year, which is not unlikely, mildly speaking, there might be a civil war and Boris Johnson might be one of the leaders of that particular civil war inside the Conservative Party. But remains to be seen.
What's the legacy, political and otherwise, of Silvio Berlusconi?
Well, to be on the positive side, he created a media empire. He did some reforms of the Italian political system after the scandals that sort of ripped apart the old political system in the past, but apart from that and in spite of the fact that he is now, sort of, given a state funeral and everyone is parading for him, that happens in situations like this, I think his legacy is mostly negative on the populist, who in three terms of government did very, very little to address the fundamental problems of the Italian economy, in the Italian state. A populist man who maneuvered, a man who had self-interest at the center of most things. But I think history will not judge him too kind.
Japanese chef Mitsuo Ise prepares a "Germany" version of okonomiyaki ahead of the G-7 summit in Hiroshima.
Hard Numbers: Hiroshima’s delicacies, Italy’s first world problems, Durham's report, Russia’s military spending, Rudy's alleged pardons grift
800: Ahead of the G-7 summit later this week in Hiroshima, Japan, some 800 restaurants specializing in a local comfort food known as okonomiyaki are hoping to make a global splash. Okonomiyaki, which means “cooked as you like it,” is a savory pancake-shaped delicacy usually made with cabbage, noodles, batter, and meat. But locals are cooking up special editions for foreign dignitaries, including a sauerkraut one for the Germans, a carbonara one for the Italians, and a burger stuffed one for the Americans. Not all locals approve.
306: The FBI rushed its investigation of ties between Russia and Donald Trump's 2016 campaign to win the White House, according to Special Counsel Robert Durham. In a 306-page report, Durham says that the Feds pursued leads based on uncorroborated evidence and showed bias in their probe — although they did not commit the "crime of the century" that Trump often cites.
200 billion: Who among us has not struggled to spend 200 billion Euros? Just two years after receiving that amount in EU COVID relief funds, Italy can’t figure out how to make good use of it all by the 2026 deadline. About a third of it is earmarked for infrastructure and public health investment, but the rest is flowing to local governments that are trying to spend it on, say, artificial ski slopes, horseracing tracks, or — cheers to this last one — a grappa museum. Senior government officials now say they’ll overhaul how the money is allocated and spent.
282: Russia’s military spending soared 282% in just the first two months of 2023 to $26 billion. That’s about 40% of the Kremlin’s planned military spending for all of 2023. Meanwhile, Russia is already suffering a budget deficit of about $40 billion for this year, as Moscow continues to finance its invasion of Ukraine amid falling energy revenues.
2 million: A female ex-employee of Rudy Giuliani is suing the former New York City mayor and lawyer to Donald Trump for sexual assault and workplace harassment. According to the lawsuit, Giuliani once told the plaintiff that he was selling federal pardons for $2 million a pop, which he and Trump would split.Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan greets the crowd before a meeting of his ruling AK Party to announce the party's election manifesto ahead of the May 14 elections, in Ankara, Turkey April 11, 2023.
Hard Numbers: Erdogan’s opposition, Myanmar military’s deadly air raids, Italian coastguard’s rescue mission, Bonnie without Clyde
6: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan kicked off his reelection campaign Tuesday in a bid to defeat six opposition parties that have joined forces ahead of the May 14 poll. Erdogan, who has been in power for two decades, vowed to cut inflation – now at 50%, thought analysts say it's higher – to single digits, though his aggressive slashing of interest rates continues to baffle economists.
100: Around 100 people, including children, are thought to have been killed on Tuesday when Myanmar’s military junta launched air raids on the central town of Pazigyi in the Sagaing region, 110 kilometers (45 miles) outside of Yangon. The region was considered a hotbed of opposition after the junta staged a coup in Feb. 2021.
1,200: The Italian coastguard is trying to rescue around 1,200 migrants stranded on two overcrowded boats off the coast of Sicily. One vessel originated in Libya, while the origin of the other fishing boat – carrying 800 people – is unclear. Italian ministers declared a state of emergency Wednesday that will free up cash to deal with the uptick in migration to Italy. How are Rome and Brussels responding to the surge? Read our primer.
13,000: A 78-year-old Missouri woman named Bonnie Gooch has been arrested for bank robbery. She allegedly gave a bank teller a note last week demanding “13,000 small bills” while banging erratically on the counter. This is her third such arrest, with her first heist dating back to 1977. Bonnie’s in jail with a $25,000 bond hanging over her head, and we’re left wondering: Where’s Clyde?
Medieval Italy, the Peruzzis & the world's first bank run
Bank runs. Market volatility. Panic in the streets. When I say we’ve been here before, I don’t just mean 2008 or 1929. One of the earliest recorded bank runs dates back to the 14th century. Italian city-states like Florence and Venice sat at the crossroads of trade routes between Asia and Europe and were financial hubs. In the early 1300s, the “Peruzzi” family quickly became one of the most powerful and wealthy in Florence, through a highly profitable textile trade that focused on imported English wool.
As their wealth grew, so did their banking network, extending throughout Europe and even to England’s King Edward the Third. King Edward at the time was embroiled in a series of expensive wars with France, which the Peruzzi's increasingly bankrolled. Unfortunately, King Edward’s appetite for battle and glory was bigger than his purse, and when he failed to pay his debts in 1345, the Peruzzi bank took a massive financial hit.
Word soon got back to Florence about the deadbeat English king. Depositors panicked, rushing to withdraw their florins before the Bank of Peruzzi ran out of funds. A bank-run ensued and, soon after, the House of Peruzzi was ruined.
The reason you’ve probably never heard of the Peruzzi's until now has quite a bit to do with the Florentine family that rose to power soon after their fall. The House of Medici [meh·duh·chee] became one of the wealthiest and most powerful families in Renaissance Europe in part by learning from the Peruzzi’s mistakes. Where the Peruzzi's focused heavily on speculative investments and individual clients (ahem, Edward the Third, ahem), the Medicis diversified their portfolio across a range of industries and regions, which protected them from risk and market volatility.
Fast-forward to today and the same pitfalls that the Peruzzi’s faced exist for modern banks that rely on overextended credit and speculation. I mean, what is crypto if not today’s version of English wool? And whether you’re the House of Peruzzi or Silicon Valley Bank, one thing is clear. Stay the heck away from the King of England.
Watch the GZERO World episode: The banking crisis, AI & Ukraine: Larry Summers weighs in
Thousands gathered at the Place de la Concorde to denounce the government’s use of a constitutional loophole to pass the pension reform, raising the retirement age without a vote in the National Assembly.
What We’re Watching: France’s fiery response, Poland’s first big step, Israeli president’s “civil war” warning
Macron bypasses the legislature on pension reform
French President Emmanuel Macron on Thursday made the risky call to bypass the National Assembly, France’s powerful lower house, and push through a very unpopular pension reform scheme.
As expected, protesters responded with anger. More than 300 people were arrested overnight, and on Friday morning demonstrators halted production at a fuel refinery and briefly blocked traffic on a highway outside Paris.
(A brief recap on the proposal that’s sent France into a tailspin: Macron’s government wants to incrementally raise the national retirement age by two years to 64 by 2030. Starting from 2027, workers will need to have worked for 43 years, up from 41, to access a full pension.)
Why’s he doing this? Macron has long said that France's public spending, 14% of which goes toward its pension scheme – the highest of any OECD country after Greece and Italy – is crucial to addressing its growing debt-to-GDP ratio. But this approach is very unpopular in France, where retirement is sacred and government interference is abhorred.
Fearing he wouldn’t have the votes in the lower chamber, Macron triggered a constitutional loophole to get the bill through (it had already passed in the upper chamber). But by taking this route – which his political opponents say renders the bill illegitimate, though it is legal – Macron now opens himself up to serious political blowback.
On Friday, a group of opposition centrist lawmakers — backed by the far-left NUPES coalition — filed a no-confidence vote against the government, while far-right leader Marine Le Pen announced she'll table her own. But any vote would need to pass by an absolute majority to topple the government – meaning PM Élisabeth Borne and the cabinet, not the president. Still, that’s very unlikely to happen, analysts say.
But Macron, who cannot run again after 2027 due to term limits, is not out of the woods. Unions have vowed to make the government pay, and prolonged strikes are expected. Meanwhile, far-left and far-right factions say they’ll intensify efforts to topple the French government.
Bibi rejects judicial compromise. What now?
It’s been another dramatic 24 hours in Israel as the country moves closer toward a constitutional crisis over judicial reform. President Isaac Herzog, whose role is largely ceremonial, came out with a compromise proposal to placate both the government — pushing to limit the power of the courts — and opposition factions that dub the move a judicial coup. Crucially, Herzog warned that the prospect of “civil war” looms large.
Five (out of six) opposition party leaders now say they support Herzog’s proposal, which they can live with despite not being perfect. But Prime Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu, who’s increasingly powerless as he tries to appease a discordant far-right coalition, rejected the pitch, calling it “one-sided.”
Meanwhile, anti-government protests continued to sweep Tel Aviv and elsewhere, and scores of army reservists said that they will not show up for training in protest.
As the government moves ahead with its plans, the future looks more and more uncertain. What’ll happen if the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, passes a law which then gets struck down by the Supreme Court? Would citizens — and the military — obey the legislature or the courts? When asked what to expect, Tzipi Livni, a former Israeli justice and foreign minister, said: "Anarchy.”
Polish fighter jets for Ukraine
Ukraine finally got its wish — sort of. On Thursday, Poland announced that it’ll supply Kyiv with MiG-29 fighter jets, the first NATO member to do so. That sounds like a big deal, right? Yes and no.
For months, Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky has been begging the US and its European friends for warplanes to fight Russia. But NATO allies have been slow-walking him because that might push the Russians to escalate on the battlefield. Yet, the Soviet-era MiGs — of which Ukraine has a few dozen relics — are hardly the modern warplanes Zelensky wants, and they’re no match for Russia’s Su-27s.
Still, perhaps Poland's gambit will encourage other NATO countries to follow suit — and maybe even force a rethink on sending Ukraine more high-tech warplanes in the future. After all, that's exactly what happened weeks ago with heavy tanks until the US and Germany changed their mind.The Graphic Truth: How much it costs to supply Ukraine
As the war in Ukraine enters its second year, proponents of continued military aid to Kyiv say it’s a cut-rate investment for security while others wonder whether the cost is worth it. We look at how much the biggest suppliers spent on military aid to Ukraine as a percentage of their defense budgets last year.