Oh, the magic of democracy! Three European election results have lifted spirits in Brussels: Poland’s parliamentary vote of October 2007, the Serbian presidential ballot of February 3, and the first round of Cyprus’s presidential election last Sunday.
In each case, the winners stood for better relations with the European Union and a co-operative approach to solving European diplomatic problems. The losers were prickly, obstructive nationalists and the opposite of everything the EU likes to think it stands for.Whether these three results will be enough to wipe out the painful memory of the Dutch and French referendums of 2005 that killed off the EU’s experiment in constitution-building remains to be seen. But for many in Brussels, the message from Poland, Serbia and Cyprus is that democracy not only works, but strengthens the EU and the cause of European integration.
In other words, don’t be afraid of the voters – they can be trusted, in the end, to get it right. In Poland, the October election produced a whopping defeat for Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the prime minister who had achieved the reckless feat of simultaneously irritating Germany and Russia, Poland’s far more powerful neighbours. The winner was Donald Tusk and his pro-European, pro-business Civic Platform party.
In Serbia, the pro-European Boris Tadic scored a victory over the ultra-nationalist Tomislav Nikolic that was narrow but just enough to let the EU claim that Serb voters had chosen a European path over the road of darkness.
Most intriguing of all was Sunday’s result in Cyprus. This saw the elimination of Tassos Papadopoulos, the president who persuaded Greek Cypriots in 2004 to reject a United Nations settlement for the divided island. Instead, former foreign minister Yiannakis Cassoulides and Demetris Christofias, the communist party leader, will fight out the run-off next Sunday. Both campaigned on a platform of resuming the peace talks with the Turkish Cypriots of the north whom the Papadopoulos administration had ignored since 2004. It would hardly be an exaggeration to say the EU has been thoroughly frustrated and depressed about Cyprus for the past four years. The EU’s original idealistic hope was to encourage a deal between Greek and Turkish Cypriots by offering the lure of EU membership to both communities as part of a reunited country.
The Turkish Cypriots bought into this and approved the UN plan. The Greek Cypriots, thanks to Papadopoulos, did not. But the EU had already promised to let the Greek Cypriots join if it proved impossible to reach a settlement. As a result, Cyprus entered the EU as a Greek Cypriot entity – and virtually all the EU’s leverage disappeared. Cyprus has been particularly hostile to Turkey’s aspirations to membership, acting a way that most EU governments regard as quite contrary to the EU spirit.
Meanwhile, Turkish Cypriots have grown increasingly disillusioned with the EU. Of course, we shall have to wait and see how things pan out after Sunday’s second round of voting. It would be foolish to expect too much too soon – Cyprus is Europe’s “frozen conflict” par excellence. But in Brussels, they are crossing their fingers – and hoping the democratic process does the trick again.
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