Merkel, Macron slam door in face of Europeans between Aegean and Adriatic

It is 15 years since the EU took in eight new European nations all formerly occupied by the Red Army and in effect colonies of the former Soviet imperium. Of all the enlargements of the European Community, now Union, since the first one in 1973 to take in Britain, Denmark and Ireland, the transformation of the eight central and east European states is without historical precedent.

In little more than a decade they have left behind not just the decades of Soviet colonization but also broken decisively with a pre-1939 heritage of nationalism, clericalism, anti-Semitism and endemic poverty that drove millions to emigrate to West Europe, North America or Australia.
Visit any major city in Poland, the Czech Republic, the Baltic states or Slovakia and you see modern European streets, buildings, offices with every European firm, bank or other business highly visible alongside...