Seismic activity moving closer to Amorgos; schools shut on four islands through Friday
Seismic activity that began on Saturday continued in the sea area between Santorini and Amorgos on Monday.
EU-US cooperation is crucial, Mitsotakis says
During the emergency European Council meeting in Brussels on Monday, Kyriakos Mitsotakis emphasized that cooperation between Europe and the United States is essential to address major shared challenges.
Androulakis: Clear European decisions are necessary
Main opposition PASOK-Movement for Change leader Nikos Androulakis on Monday participated in the pre-congress of the leaders of the Party of European Socialists in Brussels. In his statements, he pointed out that “the European leaders have an obligation to stop daydreaming and take decisions that will make the citizens feel safe in every country of the Union. Clear decision with specific steps.
https://www.amna.gr/en/article/881300/Androulakis-Clear-European-decisions-are-necessary
Former head of OSE testifies as suspect in Tempe disaster probe
The former president of OSE, Spyros Pateras, appeared before a prosecutor on Tuesday to explain why the company had not handed over to the investigative authorities videos relating to the movement of a freight train involved in the Tempe head-on collision in February 2023.
ATHEX: Bourse posts slump on Trump tariffs
The Greek stock market paid dearly for the announcement by Donald Trump about heavy tariffs on imports to the US, suffering huge losses on Monday in line with virtually all international markets. The benchmark at Athinon Avenue reported its biggest daily slump in about six months, having reached a 13.5-year high last week. However, the cause of the slump is such that allows for certain optimism that the situation will be easily reversed if the threats about a trade war prove no more than just threats.
https://www.ekathimerini.com/economy/1260570/athex-bourse-posts-slump-on-trump-tariffs
KATHIMERINI: The plans for evacuation and the mysteries of Anydros
TA NEA: Seismic activity in the Greek islands: era of alertness begins
EFIMERIDA TON SYNTAKTON: Trump’s tariff war: You will pay the bill!
RIZOSPASTIS: A thrilling journey with the unforgettable composer Thanos Mikroutsikos
KONTRA NEWS: The clash regarding the Tempi case moves to the parliament
DIMOKRATIA: Greece backstabbed by Macron
NAFTEMPORIKI: Markets face issues due to tarrifs
“
DRIVING THE DAY
EUROPE’S LEADERS TALK TOUGH ON DEFENSE TO PLEASE TRUMP: Historically it hasn’t been a great sign when Europe’s top brass conducts a retreat in Belgium. But EU leaders closed out their informal chats Monday talking a big game when it comes to weathering the dual storms of Russia’s military onslaught and the United States’ nascent economic one.
Message to Trump: If you launch a trade war with Europe, we’ll hit you back. But also, please notice how much we’re bending over backward to relieve you of your security burden! Europe is like a cat that’s making adorable eyes, but it also has its (relatively short) claws out.
Tariff-ying threat: “When targeted unfairly or arbitrarily the European Union will respond firmly,” Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said at a press conference after the meeting last night, where President Donald Trump’s threat to “absolutely” impose tariffs on the EU hovered like a drone.
Will Trump listen to VDL? Von der Leyen argued that tariffs make no economic sense for either side. Will that argument work? Last night, Canadian PM Justin Trudeau managed to convince Trump to put the tariffs he threatened to impose on Canada on hold for a month. Trump also concluded a similar temporary cease-fire with Mexico — but his tariffs on China still hold.
There is a suggestion that the White House is “blackmailing” the EU into buying not only its energy but its weapons, the former head of the European Defense Agency Claude-France Arnould told the Brussels Institute for Geopolitics think tank’s Luuk van Middelaar in this conversation. “My biggest worry is that even though we know that we need to act as Europeans […] we still lack the means to do so,” she said.
Toxic friends? Fellow EU president António Costa framed the EU and U.S. as old pals whose friendship “will endure in time” but who might benefit from sitting down and having a frank discussion to sort out their differences. Costa’s bottom line was that the EU won’t compromise on its interests, nor renege from the sacrosanct “inviolability of borders,” a nod to Trump’s threat to seize Greenland from Denmark.
If you can’t beat ‘em: His call to defend EU interests was echoed by top diplomat Kaja Kallas, as she laid out a more bullish, “more transactional” foreign policy.
Von der Leyen neatly summarized her own approach to dealing with Trump, and all the challenges on the way: “Be prepared … be very pragmatic, engage early, discuss and negotiate if necessary.” And “focus on our own challenges.” Yet, she said the U.S. remains “our most consequential relationship.”
Carrots in stock: When it comes to its political signaling to Trump, the EU is following a pretty classic approach of carrots and sticks — which is just about all that Europe’s understocked armies would currently have to fight back with against Russia.
Can’t even agree on facts: There was an obvious bit of mis-messaging when Costa and von der Leyen each presented slightly different calculations about the amount Europe was spending on defense — exactly the sort of facts Donald Trump is sensitive to.
Take cover, words incoming: Von der Leyen also said the EU will come forward “by March” with its much anticipated White Flag. Sorry, I mean White Paper. That should provide a “basis” for countries to make decisions in June.
How are we paying for all this? An age-old debate in Brussels concerns how to pay for this increase in defense production. A consensus emerged from the meeting that more flexibility in the EU’s debt rules is needed to allow for investing more in weapons, etc. Von der Leyen talked of “extraordinary measures” for “extraordinary times.”
But nein, that’s still no endorsement of EU defense bonds: There’s no “prospect of taking on joint debt,” German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said when leaving the meeting.
LITTLE NATO MEN ON GREENLAND? NATO chief Mark Rutte, who joined the EU leaders for lunch, tried to defang the threat from the U.S. president by offering to let NATO secure the Arctic territory, potentially by stationing alliance troops there, reports Jacopo Barigazzi today.
SE-CURE STARMER: Keir Starmer’s appearance Monday was the first by a British leader at a European Council meet-up since Brexit. It was a prelude to a big EU-U.K. summit that von der Leyen described as a “common joint defense summit in the U.K.” Costa hinted that it would happen on May 19. Meanwhile, the British press is full of reports about how Starmer is refusing to criticize Trump’s tariff threat against the EU, given that Britain might well be spared.
SCOOP — WALLOON CASTLE BOSS STILL EXPECTS TO GET PAID: The owner of the Belgian castle where EU leaders originally planning to hold their big defense meeting told Playbook he is negotiating a fee with the European Council. “They know full well I haven’t done anything wrong,” said Denis Gravet, owner of the 19th-century Château de Limont in Wallonia. He said he was disappointed that the venue was changed because “it would have been something exceptional for the castle.”
Retreat from the castle: Gravet said he was initially contacted about the gathering in late December. Since then, a team of up to 10 staff worked long hours to make sure everything was ready for the international meeting, until the Council changed its mind, citing security concerns relating to farmers protesting. Gravet insisted he has “very good relations” with the Council and refused to reveal the size of the contract it agreed with him. “We’re still in negotiation,” he said.
Imaginary farmers? Ségolène Plomteux from the FWA — the biggest farmers’ lobby group in Wallonia — said she wasn’t aware of any plans by farmers to protest during the meeting and was “quite surprised” to hear it.
TARIFF STANDOFF
TRADE WAR LATEST: Although Mexico and Canada won last-minute reprieves from Trump’s threatened tariffs on Monday night after making concessions on border and crime enforcement, duties on China came into effect as Playbook was preparing for publication. China immediately retaliated, but the Wall Street Journal reported overnight that Beijing is hoping to negotiate a truce, with neither side truly desiring an all-out trade war. Trump said he expects U.S. officials to talk to Beijing “probably over the next 24 hours.”
Brussels risks alienating China: Europe’s leaders are racing to find a strategy to persuade Trump to spare the EU from his trade war, with added urgency after he called the bloc’s trading relationship with the U.S. an “atrocity.” But that could potentially provoke a battle with Beijing, my colleagues Jordyn Dahl and Camilles Gijs report this morning.
It could be a dangerous miscalculation. Agathe Demarais, senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, warns that EU member countries are so divided on how to deal with Beijing that there’s “virtually zero chance” the bloc could adopt measures strong enough to impress Trump. François Godement, of the Paris-based Institut Montaigne think tank, said that joining Trump in bashing China “would only feed the public social media mud-slinging contest.” Read their full piece here.
ARE TRADE WARS EASY TO WIN? Our Trade Editor Douglas Busvine has an essential primer today on the reality of trade wars, explaining what Trump wants and whether Europe can escape his wrath. Read it here.
COMMISSION
EAU MY GOD! Today the Commission will publish reports that are expected to warn about the poor condition of surface water in EU countries, feeding into ongoing work on a European Water Resilience Strategy. It’s a priority for Environment Commissioner Jessika Roswall, planned for sometime between April and June of this year. Leonie Cater has the full details for Morning Sustainability subscribers.
SPOKESPERSON SHAKE-UP: Some of the European Commission spokespeople are getting new portfolios, in an internal shake-up set to be announced today, an EU official told Playbook. Maciej Berestecki takes environment and hands over agriculture to Balazs Ujvari and transport to Anna-Kaisa Itkonen; Ujvari hands Switzerland, micro-states and EEA to Olof Gill. Deputy spox Stefan De Keersmaecker will at some point join DG COMM, but that might not happen for months, the official said.
BERLAYMONSTER IS BACK: Former European Commission sec-gen Martin Selmayr was spotted pacing down Rue de la Loi on Monday. Selmayr, now the EU’s ambassador to the Vatican, is in town for EEAS’ annual conclave.
Historical note: Before Selmayr and his erstwhile boss Jean-Claude Juncker started centralizing the European Commission — a process that has accelerated under Ursula von der Leyen — there were over 35 spokespeople. Now there are … 14.
Talking of once-powerful secretary-generals … Playbook also spotted former Parliament chief Klaus Welle getting splashed by a passing car on Rue de la Loi last week. He looked upset — but that’s what you get when you walk in the cycling lane.
COUNTRIES TALK EU-INDIA: EU envoys will meet the European Commission today to discuss the upcoming EU-India Trade and Technology Council in New Delhi on Feb. 28, which will be the commissioners’ first joint trip abroad in this mandate. An EU diplomat described the meeting as largely performative, Camille Gijs reports.
PARLIAMENT
MARIA ARENA’S SON ARRESTED: The son of Qatargate suspect and former Socialists and Democrats (S&D) MEP Maria Arena, Ugo Lemaire, was arrested on suspicion of drug smuggling on Monday, along with over a dozen others, according to reports in Belgian media. Le Soir reported last night that the investigation arose from searches carried out in the Qatargate case in 2023, during which police discovered around €280,000 in cash at Lemaire’s flat. (Lemaire once ran a legal cannabis company, while his mother lobbied to harmonize EU cannabis laws in the European Parliament.) Arena was herself charged in the Qatargate case last month.
EU SOCIALISTS GET IN BED WITH ECR, NOW WHAT? The S&D group leadership retreats to the village of Genval today to debate how to deal with the far-right surge — and a key question they’ll be discussing is their response to the S&D’s Flemish delegation, Vooruit, joining the new Belgian government with the nationalist N-VA, from the right-wing European Reformists and Conservatives (ECR).
They are not far right, we promise! “While we disagree with the N-VA on many issues, it should be clear that N-VA is not a far-right party,” Vooruit’s chief MEP Kathleen van Brempt told POLITICO. She added that the Belgian coalition agreement is pro-European and defends the rule of law — a similar argument to that made by the European People’s Party when defending an alliance with Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy.
Socialist HQ is not bothered: A definitive exclusion from the parliamentary group can only happen if the Party of European Socialists (PES) decides to suspend Vooruit’s membership first. But that won’t happen. PES Secretary-General Giacomo Fillibeck argued in a statement to POLITICO that N-VA is not a member of the ECR *party*, but a member of the European Free Alliance, which brings together nationalist movements, such as the Catalan Republican Left, which sits with the Greens. “We trust that our full member party Vooruit will defend our European values at the government table and in any case we will keep monitoring the situation,” he added.
IN OTHER NEWS
BRITAIN’S RESET: The U.K.’s EU Relations Minister Nick Thomas-Symonds is giving a speech in Brussels this morning in which he’s expected to set out how the post-Brexit “reset” in relations could benefit security, resilience and economic growth for both sides. European Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič will also speak at the U.K.-EU Forum’s annual conference.
Bregrets, I’ve had a few: Five years after Brexit, research in the U.K. by polling company IPSOS found that 48 percent of respondents believe that Britain’s exit from the bloc has negatively impacted their daily lives, compared to 28 percent in March 2021.
HUNGARY WELCOMES AfD: Alternative for Germany (AfD) leader Alice Weidel will travel to Budapest on Tuesday, where she’ll meet with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán to talk about migration and economic policy, my Berlin Playbook colleagues report. “The AfD could get 20 percent of the vote [in Germany]. If their leader wants to talk to me, why should I say no?” Orban told NZZ. “If Olaf Scholz called me, I would receive him too. But the danger is not acute.”