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With Ukraine plunged into darkness, the EU searches for justice
By Euronews Brussels bureau
Ukraine has been plunged into darkness.
Russia has marked the nine-month anniversary of the war with a new barrage of brutal attacks against Ukraine’s battered energy grid, robbing millions of power and water. The shelling was so devastating that it left half of neighbouring Moldova without electricity. The widespread destruction is raising fears of a massive exodus of refugees ahead of the winter season.
Against this backdrop of desolation and horror, the European Parliament passed this week a strongly-worded resolution declaring Russia a “state sponsor of terrorism” over the “brutal and inhumane” acts inflicted upon Ukraine and its population.
“I see this resolution mostly as a political statement and an important sign of solidarity,” Sergey Lagodinsky, a German MEP who sits with the Greens, told Euronews.
Although the text has no legal implications, its content is highly symbolic. Shortly after MEPs approved the resolution by an overwhelming margin, the European Parliament’s website was hacked by a “sophisticated cyberattack” and became temporarily unavailable.
“What do you call a state that attacks citizens, that is guilty of over 40,000 documented war crimes? A state that tries to kill civilians by freezing them to death?” said Vlad Gheorghe, a Romanian MEP from Renew Europe.
“This is a very important step, but it can also be a step that leads to more freezing of Russian state assets and giving those straight back to Ukraine.”
The confiscation of Russian assets has become an acute dilemma for the European Union. Under an unprecedented raft of sanctions, the bloc has frozen about $300 billion in funds from Russia’s central bank, together with high-value assets held by dozens of blacklisted oligarchs.
But how to confiscate these possessions and turn them into money for Ukraine’s reconstruction remains an unresolved question. State assets are protected under international law, while there is no legal framework in place to expropriate private property of sanctioned individuals.
“Every decision that we take, it needs to be based in law and we are now writing that legislation in order for us to be able to get to the Russian assets,” Gheorghe said.
“We will not be able to do it alone. We will probably need additional funding. And this additional funding is the funding of the perpetrator,” Lagodinsky added. “So, we need to get our act together, intellectually, and see how we can conceptualise a possible way to get to that money.”
But as the EU scrambles to find new financial sources to help Ukraine maintain its state budget and repair its badly-damaged infrastructure, a pressing challenge emerges at home: how to tackle the spiralling energy crisis and support vulnerable households and companies.
“We will not be able to sustain this winter and give the much-needed social and financial help to the citizens, if member states do not help each other,” Lagodinsky said. “That’s why I think that we will not be able to avoid getting more mutual debt as the European Union in order to have a solidarity fund.”
“But to be honest,” he continued, “our burdens, as much as I understand our burdens, are not comparable to the burdens of Ukrainians, who are being killed, tortured and raped right now.”
Sitting by his side, Vlad Gheorghe agreed, expressing confidence that Europe’s solidarity with Ukraine will remain firm and unwavering all through the winter and beyond.
“Peace is priceless. You simply cannot put a price on peace,” he said. “We are Europeans. We have it now. We understand how to appreciate it more because we have a war at our borders.”
“We, as a union, are as strong as the link between our states,” Gheorghe added. “So this is our strength, our solidarity and our unity. If we lose that, we lose everything to Putin.”
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WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON?
THE FRONTLINE In a virtual address to the UN Security Council, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy denounced Russia’s attacks against essential infrastructure as “crimes against humanity” and urged the international community to stop them. “Energy terror is comparable to the use of weapons of mass destruction,” Zelenskyy said. The continued shelling of Ukraine has reportedly depleted Russia of a significant amount of their high-precision missiles. Meanwhile, a new exchange of prisoners of war between the warring parties seems increasingly likely. And in Moscow, lawmakers approved a controversial law banning LGBTQ “propaganda” to adults, as Amnesty International raises again the alarm on the crackdown of protesters.
HARD TIMES AHEAD If Russia’s war in Ukraine doesn’t end by the time next winter hits, Europe’s energy woes will be “even worse,” Paolo Gentiloni, European Commissioner for the economy, told Euronews. “We have a mixed picture overall in 2023,” Gentiloni said. But he added that a recession was not a “given” despite the gloomy forecasts. Read the interview.
NORDIC AID In Finland and Sweden, the militaries know a thing or two about extreme cold weather combat, and how to battle the elements. This wisdom is becoming increasingly handy for Ukraine as it prepares to fight in a long, harsh winter. “It is important that we keep supporting Ukraine and providing it with the means to end the war,” Antti Kaikkonen, Finland's minister of defence, told Euronews. Our Nordic expert David Mac Dougall has the full story.
‘IT’S A BAD JOKE’ After weeks of mounting political pressure, the European Commission has unveiled its proposal for a EU-wide cap on gas prices. But the conditions attached to the cap are so stringent and specific that the measure might never be actually triggered. Energy ministers blasted the Commission’s draft, calling it “flawed,” “not fit for purpose” and a “bad joke.” The deep disagreements among member states delayed the approval of two separate energy regulations. Jorge Liboreiro breaks down the details of the long-awaited price cap.
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ELEVENTH HOUR The leaders of Serbia and Kosovo reached a last-minute agreement to end their dispute over licence plates, a prolonged standoff that many saw as a dangerous prelude to a renewed conflict in the region. “We have a deal,” said Josep Borrell, the EU’s foreign policy chief who served as mediator in the talks.
AFTER COP The European Union was left visibly “disappointed” by the final deal struck at COP27. “We have treated some of the symptoms but not cured the patient from its fever,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said. This is why the bloc did not like the deal, at all.
INDY REF The UK Supreme Court has ruled that Scotland’s parliament does not have the legal authority to hold a referendum on independence next year, dashing the hopes of the nationalist party. So what happens next? Predicting the future in politics is notoriously difficult, but Joshua Askew outlines the three main possible scenarios that could play out in Scotland.
TWITTER CHAOS The Euronews Next team raises a quasi-existential question: If Twitter dies under Elon Musk’s erratic leadership, what will replace it?
TAKE A WALK Are you the kind of traveller who likes to stroll the streets on holiday? If so, this list is for you. Euronews Travel selects Europe’s most walkable cities.
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IT'S IN THE NUMBERS
It’s been a bleak week in the United States. On Tuesday, a Walmart employee killed six people in Virginia. On Sunday, a gunman shot five people to death and injured 18 more in a LGBT nightclub in Colorado. According to the Gun Violence Archive, a non-profit project, this year has seen 609 mass shootings across the country. A total of 291 children have been murdered.
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EDITOR'S CHOICE
Inside the new Hungarian think tank in Brussels promising to ‘shake up the European debate’
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| |  24 november 2022 |
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A new Hungarian think tank partially funded by the hard-right government of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has opened its doors in Brussels. The main aim of MCC Brussels, executive director Frank Füredi told Euronews, “is to offer an alternative narrative” to the so-called EU bubble, which he says “tends to be very conformist and create a quarantine against views that are different.” But critics say the think tank has been set up to push Orbán’s vision of Europe. Our reporter Alice Tidey attended its launch event, which took place at the Atomium, a landmark building in Brussels located outside of the European quarter. This is what Alice discovered about Hungary's brand-new think tank.
MONEY TALKS The European Commission is ready to recommend that an estimated €7.5 billion in EU funds be withheld from Hungary over corruption concerns, Euronews has learned. This sum amounts to roughly 65% of the funds Budapest received under EU Cohesion programmes. |
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