by Maygar Nemzet at REMIX
French President Emmanuel Macron, right, welcomes German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Monday, June 12, 2023, at the Elysée palace in Paris. (AP Photo/Michel Euler)
In what may be the beginning of the end for European nations, Germany and France are determined to reform national rights, including the EU right of veto, this year. The debate has caused a stir in recent months, and in recent weeks, the measure has been put back on the agenda.
France and Germany are convinced that a large-scale institutional reform of the European Union, including the abolition of the veto on European Council votes, could be achieved this year, French EU Affairs Minister Laurence Boone and German Minister of State Anna Lührmann told Euractiv.
“This is one of the options we want to explore in order to maintain our position as a global player with the EU’s common foreign and security policy,” Lührmann said. He added that “it would be an important signal in other policy areas if we were to move to qualified majority voting already this year” and expressed confidence that this would happen.
Wir wollen die 🇪🇺 fit für die Erweiterung machen. Mit der 🇩🇪🇫🇷-Expert:innengruppe wollen wir dieser Debatte in der EU eine hohe Priorität einräumen. Klar ist: Eine erweiterte EU muss handlungsfähig bleiben. Mehr dazu im ITV mit @LaurenceBoone👇@EURACTIVhttps://t.co/k5kDPj1tal
— Anna Lührmann (@AnnaLuehrmann) June 23, 2023
The two ministers said that both countries consider it important to abolish unanimous voting in the European Council in areas such as foreign policy and taxation before the enlargement of the European Union. This could mean, for example, that Brussels would be able to implement a flat tax rate across the EU or even involve itself more deeply in the war, both moves that Hungary has rejected and in some cases even deployed its veto to stop.
Paris and Berlin claim abolishing the veto is a change that is possible without amending the EU treaties,…
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