Austria Wants to Close the EU for Migrants

The New Fedaralist - After Viktor Orban and Matteo Salvini, Sebastian Kurz enters more and more in the anti-immigration parade. His voice has been even more strengthened since his country, Austria, took over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union last Sunday.

1st of July is indeed always a turning point (at least a symbolic one) for the European Union. The Austrian Presidency followed the Bulgarian one. What happened during the six months of the Bulgarian Presidency, led by Boyko Borisov (the Bulgarian Prime Minister) under the mantra of a Europe of "solidarity"?

Bulgarian Presidency: the pending reform of the Istanbul Convention

No fewer than 1500 meetings and events were organised by the departing Presidency. While some topics such as energy efficiency or the rapprochement between the EU and the Balkans advanced successfully (for instance during the Sofia summit on 17 May), another one was left on the sidelines: the Istanbul Convention.

Malin Björk, Swedish MEP from the European United Left (GUE), who initiated the parliamentary debate on this Convention of the Council of Europe, called the Bulgarian boycott of the parliamentary discussions a "cruel, sexist and homophobic attack against women and the LGBT community". This convention, recently ratified by Greece (18 June) and Croatia (12 June) aims at fighting violence against women, but Bulgaria, just like Slovakia, where the family model remains traditionalist, considered it as a Trojan horse aiming at introducing a "third gender" or same-sex marriage.

Finally, it goes without saying that Boyko Borisov probably teared up while clearing his desk. Despite his promise of more solidarity in Europe, the last events in the Mediterranean proved the contrary.