Posted on 01/15/2007 10:58:30 AM PST by NormsRevenge
STRASBOURG (AFP) - A new extreme-right group, including veteran French firebrand Jean-Marie Le Pen and Mussolini's granddaughter, was formally created in the European parliament, parliamentary president Josep Borrell announced.
The "Identity, Tradition, Sovereignty," group which "slightly changes the political geography of our parliament" has fulfilled the conditions for its formal recognition, said Borrell at the start of a plenary session in Strasbourg.
Those rules notably include the requirement that at least 20 MEPs from five EU member states to sign up for the new political group. The formal setting up of the bloc allows it various rights including receiving official funding of around one million euros (770,000 dollars) and certain speaking rights.
French National Front MEP Bruno Gollnisch will lead the new far right bloc whose founding principles include recognising "national interests, sovereignties, identities and differences", and opposing a "unitary, bureaucratic, European superstate".
Its platform also includes commitments to Christian and traditional family values.
The membership includes seven members of the French National Front, including Le Pen and his daughter Marine Le Pen.
Its formation was made possible by the accession of Romania and Bulgaria to the EU on January 1 this month, as five Romanian MEPs have signed up as well as a Bulgarian.
There are also three Belgian deputies from the Flemish nationalist Vlaams Belang party, including its president Franck Vanhecke.
The membership list also includes Austrian Andreas Molzer, British MEP Ashley Mote and Alessandra Mussolini, the granddaughter of Italian wartime dictator Benito Mussolini.
Socialist Group leader Martin Schulz immediately questioned the group's legitimacy, asking whether it adhered to the rules of parliament which stipulate that the members of a group must share a political position.
But Borrell rejected the call for an enquiry into the group's legitimacy, noting that the 20 members had all signed a political declaration.
Schulz nonethless called on MEPs to prevent the new far-Right group from securing senior positions in the European Parliament.
Immediately after the announcement of the 20-member group's formation, Schulz wrote to fellow leaders of the parliament's democratic groups, urging them to deny the new group posts under the proportional system of appointment.
"We must not abandon this parliament, which symbolises the integration of Europe, to those who deny all European values," he said.
After reports that he had been described as a "totalitarian" by Gollnisch, Schulz said: "To be attacked by a man who is a holocaust denier and who represents the neo-fascist movement is an honour for me."
In his letter to other group leaders, Schulz said that while the new group would enjoy the privileges and staffing normally given to a political group they should not be approved as vice-presidents of parliamentary committees.
It is not the first time that the far-right has had a bloc in the assembly. Le Pen led the Group of the European Right from 1984 to 1989, and the Technical Group of the European Right from 1989 to 1994.
European Parliament President Josep Borrell gives a farewell speech in the European Parliament, in Strasbourg. A new extreme-right group, including veteran French firebrand Jean-Marie Le Pen and Mussolini's granddaughter, was formally created in the European parliament, Borrell announced.(AFP/Frederick Florin)
Far-right group formed in European Parliament ^
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1765085/posts
Posted by Rodney King
On News/Activism ^ 01/09/2007 7:52:57 PM PST · 17 replies · 483+ views
EU Observer ^ | today | Honor Mahoney
Far-right group formed in European Parliament 09.01.2007 - 17:35 CET | By Honor Mahony EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - Far-right MEPs have managed to club together in the European Parliament, getting enough members to form a political group entitling them to EU funds. The group was created on Tuesday (9 January) and managed to get just the threshold number of deputies needed under EU rules - 20 MEPs from six different member states. The diverse group which houses politicians from Romania's anti-Roma xenophobic Greater Romania Party, through to France's and Belgium's anti-immigrant National Front and Vlaams Belang. The group also includes...
Sounds like Savage's "Boarders, Language, Culture" mantra.
Interesting how AFP tries to demonize it by making a reference to Mussolini's grandaughter, but leave out the fact that Mussolini's was a socialist dictator, a pal of their hero, Stalin, not an "extreme" righty,(which in Europe is probably a centrist) like his grandaughter.
Christian and traditional family values.
oh the horror.
When you have nothing else to say, there is always obligatory 'your a racist' attack by a leftist.
Anyone in Yerp who isn't mushy pink as reflected in the governments they elect is "far right" by definition these days.
Given the fact that 200,000 fascist Italian troops fought alongside the Nazis against the Soviets (20,000 Italians died, 65,000 were captured) at the Battle of Stalingrad, it seems unlikely that Stalin was much of a pal of Mussolini's.
It would be interesting to hear him expand on this. Evidently the values Schulz considers "European" are in opposition to those this new coalition espouses. probably in the arena of the supremacy of supernational over national values. But it may be that this also includes the sort of blindfolded inclusionism that we have come to term "mutliculturalism," and I'd love to know if that's the sort of "European" value Schulz feels is threatened. If so, he's right, and it might be that particular unquestionable canon is in bad need of a close review.
These aren't, of course, necessarily nice people, Le Pen père in particular, and it may be that what Schulz was getting at was that the bloc is inherently subversive to the overall mission of European unity, not simply to its underlying values. European FReepers, some input here, please?
"Far Right" means nothing anymore. Been used on everything from center left conservatives to nazis.
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