Rival inquiry proposals over OPEKEPE head to Parliament
The political standoff over the OPEKEPE farm subsidy scandal has entered a new phase as three rival proposals head to Parliament, highlighting stark differences between the ruling party and the opposition. The government is submitting a motion to establish an investigative committee covering the period from 1998 to the present, aiming to examine long-standing structural failures within OPEKEPE. In contrast, PASOK and a joint bloc of SYRIZA and New Left are calling for a pre-investigative committee to probe possible felony charges against former ministers Makis Voridis and Lefteris Avgenakis, based on documents sent to Parliament by the European Public Prosecutor’s Office.
Androulakis: Greeks ‘do not deserve a weak and politically blackmailed prime minister’
PASOK-Movement for Change (KINAL) leader Nikos Androulakis launched a direct attack on Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis in Parliament on Wednesday, accusing him of calling for an investigation into decades of EU fund distributions in Greece by OPEKEPE agency in order “to write off the offenses” of former ministers Makis Voridis and Lefteris Avgenakis.
Signs of tourism slowdown
The first indications that the growth of Greek tourism, at least in terms of arrivals, is slowing down – especially at certain popular destinations – are provided by data from passenger traffic at the 14 regional airports and in coastal shipping, on top of information from the hotel market and travel agencies.
https://www.ekathimerini.com/economy/1275400/signs-of-tourism-slowdown
IELKA: Climate change and finding proper staff are the main challenges in retail, FMCG
Increased costs, finding and retaining staff and climate change are the main problems of retail and Fast-Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) industry executives, according to a survey by the Retail Consumer Goods Research Institute (IELKA) published on Wednesday.
ATHEX: Stocks ease, but a jump appears due
The majority of stocks at Athinon Avenue recorded minor losses on Wednesday, in a market that appeared to lack direction and showed a variety of patterns over the course of the day, only to settle for a small decline for the benchmark. Losing stocks outnumbered gainers at a two-to-one ratio despite the small growth trend registered on most other eurozone bourses. Observers wonder whether this might be the springboard for the impending jump to the 2,000-point mark for the main index.
https://www.ekathimerini.com/economy/1275536/athex-stocks-ease-but-a-jump-appears-due
KATHIMERINI: More tourists are coming but they are spending less
TA NEA: Alzheimer’s – Parkinson’s: one step closer to cure
EFIMERIDA TON SYNTAKTON: Europe of war, racism and austerity
RIZOSPASTIS: Code of conduct in the public sector: the new suppression and penalization framework must be abolished
KONTRA NEWS: 4-euro tax on all cigarette packs to fund weapons for Ukraine
DIMOKRATIA: The PM has a PhD in cover-ups
NAFTEMPORIKI: EU fears a trade halt due to tariffs
DRIVING THE DAY: BRUSSELS’ BIG, BUREAUCRATIC BILL
THE BUDGET BRAWL IS JUST BEGINNING: The EU’s hulking next seven-year budget was finally ushered into the world on Wednesday — and in typical Brussels fashion, it was as anodyne and bureaucratic on the surface as it was chaotic and political behind the scenes. Clearly, the Commission is starting as it means to go on for the next two years of fraught negotiations.
The headline figure: The Commission’s pitching the budget as an “almost” €2 trillion sum, although a piece of that will go to paying back the bloc’s post-Covid debts. The programs themselves add up to €1.816 trillion. Our full write-up is here.
Anatomy of a fumble: Commissioners got the final plan moments before they were supposed to sign off on it — and were getting updates from media reports instead of from their boss. Ambassadors didn’t have the documents during the meeting where they were supposed to be discussing them. The Commission’s presentation cited figures adding up to a 101 percent budget. MEPs didn’t have access to the figures before their meeting with the Commission to debate the plan, and budget czar Piotr Serafin turned up four hours late.
Meaning: Brussels spent a whole day discussing a crucial document no one had actually seen, with only the Commission’s PR to go on.
Mysterious math: No one seemed to be able to make sense of how the mammoth sums actually add up. At the presser, a visibly tired Ursula von der Leyen recited figure after figure from the PR pitch, but dodged questions about the breakdown of the numbers from confused journalists.
In the room where it happened: Gregorio Sorgi has this piece on what played out inside the Berlaymont as the hours ticked down to the budget announcement — with von der Leyen’s tight grip over the figures and refusal to discuss them in advance meaning she was forced to make major concessions at the 11th hour.
Knives out: As soon as von der Leyen took to the Berlaymont podium, the wave of criticism arrived. The cash pot is either too big (the frugals, Germany), not big enough (the Socialists), undemocratic (the European Parliament), and screwing everyone from farmers to regions to the climate to the disabled.
Now read this: Our crack team of reporters has this detailed breakdown of the winners and losers, as well as this deep dive on the bungled announcement around agricultural funding.
You can’t please everyone: For all of von der Leyen’s centralizing and secrecy, one point remains: It’s impossible to win with the EU budget, no matter who’s in charge. Everyone wants money. No one wants to pay.
The fight ahead: The budget needs the sign-off of all EU countries and the European Parliament by 2027. So get ready for two years of this.
PLAYBOOK INTERVIEW: ICELAND’S FOREIGN MINISTER
VDL HEADS FROM ONE VOLCANO TO ANOTHER: Fresh from late-night haggling over the budget, von der Leyen is heading to Iceland today to meet the country’s prime minister and tour an air base. Arriving while there’s an active volcanic eruption perhaps isn’t the most auspicious sign, but the Commission chief should have plenty to be cheerful about anyway, with Iceland in a pro-EU mood and down to cooperate with Brussels on defense and trade.
A not-so-frosty reception: Playbook spoke with Iceland’s Foreign Minister Þorgerður Katrín Gunnarsdóttir ahead of the visit. She was bullish about the country’s EU prospects, saying there’s enough public support in Iceland to reopen accession talks, and that she wants to “speed up the process.” Read the full interview here.
Will accession be on the agenda for today’s visit? “We will discuss a lot of things,” said Gunnarsdóttir, who is also the leader of Iceland’s pro-EU Reform party. She said VDL’s visit shows “the growing relationship between Iceland and the EU” at a time of shared challenges on “security and defense, resilience and civil protection and … international trade.”
We’ve been down this road before: Iceland was in accession talks from 2010-13 until the right-wing government in power at the time halted the process. The current pro-EU coalition has promised a referendum on restarting talks by 2027. According to recent polling, just over half of Icelanders support a reopening, but backing is lower for EU membership itself, with just 45 percent in favor.
Fish-ticuffs to come: Gunnarsdóttir said she expects that accession talks would move quickly if reopened because of all the groundwork covered in the 2010s. But, as anyone who remembers Brexit can attest, that’s before we get to the issue of fish. “Sensitive, emotional” topics like fisheries, agriculture and energy would be the touchier subjects in any future negotiations, the minister said.
And then there’s Greenland. U.S. President Donald Trump’s threats to annex neighboring Greenland are casting a shadow in Iceland ahead of the referendum. The country’s prime minister has said she doesn’t want citizens to vote to join the EU out of fear. Gunnarsdóttir said the government is “still discussing” the American moves on Greenland and “how they will affect us here in Iceland,” but she said there are “no indications” that future U.S. policy on Iceland will change. In the meantime, the Arctic nation is “strengthening our discussion and relationship to the U.S. as well to the EU,” she said.
And as for that volcano … Not an issue for VDL’s visit, Gunnarsdóttir said. It’s business as usual in Iceland. The fiery welcome is even a good thing, she added, because it gives the country a chance to showcase its “endurance and resilience but also resourcefulness” in the face of a turbulent landscape.
NATIONAL INTRIGUE
SPAIN HAS SURPASSED GERMANY AS THE EU’S TOP ASYLUM-SEEKER DESTINATION, the FT reports, citing an unpublished report by the EU Agency for Asylum. Per the report, a key reason is the fall of the Assad regime, which has led to fewer Syrians applying for protection in the EU.
FRENCH PM’S POLITICAL SUICIDE? NOT SO FAST: Proposing to scrap bank holidays, freeze welfare payments, slash well-staffed bureaucracy and cut billions from the health care system? We don’t want to tell French Prime Minister François Bayrou how to do his job, but … these are the people who made the guillotine famous for a reason.
Mais non: As our Paris colleagues lay out in this piece, the widespread outrage Bayrou triggered in unveiling his aggressive plan to squeeze next year’s budget by €43.8 billion could actually spell good news for the embattled prime minister, by staking out an extreme position with plenty of bargaining chips to kick off negotiations.
THORN IN TUSK’S SIDE: One-time Polish political wunderkind Szymon Hołownia, now parliament speaker, is emerging as a weak link who could threaten Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s centrist pro-EU coalition. His Polska 2050 party has a crucial 31 seats that help Tusk keep his majority, but he has been accused of flirting with PiS. Wojciech Kość has the details.
PRISON FOR ERDOĞAN FOE: A Turkish criminal court sentenced jailed Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, the main rival of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, to one year and eight months in prison for insulting and threatening Istanbul’s chief prosecutor. Write-up here.
IN OTHER NEWS
HAPPENING TODAY: U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer will welcome German Chancellor Friedrich Merz to London to sign the biggest U.K.-German treaty since 1945. Esther Webber and Nette Nöstlinger tee up the trip.
TO EU OR NOT TO EU? Does the EU’s projected bump in defense spending mean there will be more bloc-wide defense policy? Defense Commissioner Andrius Kubilius seems to think so. He told Jacopo Barigazzi that the EU’s five-fold jump in spending on defense and space, to €131 billion, “would allow the European Union to create real and significant added value by helping member states to strengthen their own defense capabilities and those of Europe as a whole in the most effective way.”
Bruegel’s Guntram Wolff had the opposite read, telling Jacopo that “€131 billion, while it sounds large, needs to be put into perspective. Over seven years, this is €18.7 billion per year. So the message from the EU budget is clear: defense remains primarily a national job.”
MCGRATH TAKES AIM AT EU AUTHORITARIANISM: EU Democracy Commissioner Michael McGrath will call out “creeping authoritarianism” in the bloc’s politics in a speech in Berlin today, Playbook’s Tim Ross reports. McGrath will take aim at politicians who exploit public apathy and skepticism toward democracy by silencing media and politicizing courts, saying that “these tactics, if unchecked, may result in the quiet erosion of our democracies, and the slow but steady concentration of power away from the people and into the hands of the few.”
NGO WORKING GROUP UPDATE: Dirk Gotink, a Dutch lawmaker from the center-right European People’s Party, will lead the new working group set up in the European Parliament to scrutinize the European Commission’s funding of NGOs, report my colleagues Marianne Gros and Koen Verhelst. Backstory here, and more for Morning Sustainability subscribers here.
SOCIALIST SUMMIT: The Party of European Socialists will hold its party conference in Amsterdam between Oct. 16-18 and focus on “Progressive Mobilization” — an obvious concern for the group at a moment when its presence in Europe is at a low ebb, Aitor Hernández-Morales reports. Only three of the bloc’s 27 member countries are ruled by PES prime ministers — Spain’s Pedro Sánchez, Denmark’s Mette Frederiksen and Malta’s Robert Abela — and the social democrats’ presence in the European Parliament has never been so reduced. As far-right forces continue to gain traction, the center left is under pressure to prove that it remains relevant for voters.
MUSK GETS A TRUMP DIVIDEND: The European Commission is slow-walking one of its investigations into Elon Musk’s X platform for breaking digital transparency rules as it seeks to sweet-talk Donald Trump into sparing it from his harshest tariffs, the FT reports this morning.