European Commission President Ursula Von der Leyen, Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, and former Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Costa. (Photo credit: Reuters)
The recent elections to European parliament preceded the apportionment of top jobs in the European Union (EU), including the topmost job of EU Commissioner and the post of the Foreign Policy chief for the union. Two women have got the two of the top three jobs, Ursula von der Leyen for Commissioner, and Kaja Kallas, the incumbent Prime Minister of Estonia. Former Prime Minister of Portugal, Antonio will be chair of the European Council.
Von der Leyen is getting a second consecutive term and Kallas first. Both are rabidly anti-Russian, which means they will drive EU’s support for Ukraine. Kallas, who is set to replace Josep Borrell of Spain, is even more fanatical than the former German Defence Minister and her likely boss at EU, and had suggested a few days ago that the Ukraine war needs to result in Russia breaking up into many small states, “which would not be a bad thing”.
The Brussels meeting also belied expectations that the recent right-ward surge in European elections, as well in the national elections in many countries would not derail the EU’s anti-Russia agenda. Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, who detests von der Leyen, abstained from voting, and Hungary’s Victor Orban, who shares Meloni’s distaste for the former German Foreign Minister, voted against.
The appointments are to be ratified by the newly-elected EU Parliament, which will convene for the first-time next month, but the approval is likely to be more of a formality.
The appointments would mean that peace in Europe would become more unattainable than ever. Both are likely to press for a military victory for Ukraine in the ongoing war, and will be against any peace talks. Von der Leyen will continue mobilising political, military and financial resources for for Ukraine, while Kallas will be rounding up political support for Ukraine, as the de facto foreign minister of the 27-nation bloc.
Moscow reacted as expected, with Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov recalling Kallas’s hostile statements towards Russia. Foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Kallas’s appointment would “only increase the level of insanity” in the EU.
Among European leaders, Kallas has been perhaps the most rabidly hostile towards Russia, and history, of Estonia being one of the three Baltic republics, the others being Latvia and Lithuania, absorbed into Soviet Union in 1940, and being part of it till 1991, perhaps explains her hatred for Russia.
The three tiny Baltic republics, totalling about six million people, continue to maintain antipathy towards Russia, and have been in the forefront of EU’s aggressive posture.
But even among them, Estonia’s Kallas has been the leading warmonger. She has demanded it a mission to lobby for stronger sanctions against Russia and more military aid for Ukraine. Under her leadership, Estonia became the first EU country to approve a mechanism to confiscate frozen Russian assets and use them as “compensation” for Kiev.
In fact, before she was nominated as the next foreign policy chief of EU. Kallas’s name was circulating for the post of head of NATO, before Mark Rutte was selected to succeed Jens Stoltenberg. NATO officials were so spooked by the prospect of NATO being headed by an arch hawk, the leader of a country with an army of 7,700 soldiers, that they pitched for former Dutch prime minister.
Kallas has advocated the idea that at some point NATO countries may have to deploy troops in Ukraine to prevent Moscow from defeating Kiev, first floated by French President Emmanuel Macron in February. “We shouldn’t be afraid of our own power,” Kallas had said.
Macron’s objective in making the suggestion was to test Russia’s reaction. But Kallas embraced it wholeheartedly and passionately began advocating it, till other EU members, like Hungary and Slovakia put their foot down and forced EU to state that it had no such ideas.
Hungary mocked Kallas by pointing out that Kallas’s husband was part owner of a transport business that moved goods in and out of Russia despite the EU embargo. Kallas hit back fiercely, calling it a witchhunt, but admitted that her husband, Arvo Hallick indeed was involved in such a business, but that she had no connection whatsoever with his business dealings. But local media punctured her story by revealing that she had lent 3,50,000 Euros to Hallik’s business.
According to Kallas, there should be no “Plan B” (meaning a peaceful solution) for Ukraine, because that would mean undermining the goal of helping Ukraine to win. Ukraine should fight till there is a military solution in the war, and then Ukraine can join NATO, even having lost a part of its territory, Kallas had said. Kallas’s hatred for Russia is such that in May this year, she made a statement that could amount to declaring war against Russia.
During a debate in the country’s capital, Tallinn, she said the Ukraine war should end with the defeat and breakup of the Russian Federation.
“Russia’s defeat is not a bad thing because then you know there could really be a change in society,” the prime minister told the conference. She argued that the Russian Federation comprised “many different nations” and proposed that they become independent states after the end of the conflict between Moscow and Kiev.
“I think if you would have more like small nations… it is not a bad thing if the big power is actually [made] much smaller,” Kallas was reported as saying.
Estonia’s Prime Minister also urged Ukraine’s Western backers not to be afraid to do more to assist the government in Kiev in its fight with Moscow. Countries must give their ‘nuclear fear’, she suggested, implying that Europe should be ready for a nuclear war.
With such a war hawk as Kallas set to drive the foreign policy of EU, and von der Leyen leading it, there is no hope of an early peaceful settlement of the Ukraine war, or the current tensions between Europe and Russia.
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