At a far-right conference in Budapest this month, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni delivered a speech bashing a supposedly “woke” left. But the pro-European Meloni showed more caution in discussing the EU with the famously Euroskeptic Viktor Orban, hinting at divisions between right-wing movements often viewed as natural allies.
Robert Fico, the highly controversial three-time former prime minister who opposes military support to Ukraine, looks set to win Slovakia’s parliamentary elections on Sept. 30. He has pledged to reverse the EU and NATO member state’s political direction, after years of deep reforms designed to realign Slovakia with the EU mainstream.
For Washington and Brussels, the IMEC trade corridor linking India, the Gulf and Europe is an effort to mold the resulting partnerships in line with Western interests. However, for India, the UAE and Saudi Arabia, their participation in the project does not reflect a desire to choose sides amid an era of great power competition.
For a political movement whose demise has been predicted so often, social democracy’s survival has at times seemed to defy logic. But recent electoral successes of center-left parties in Germany and Spain along with the Labour Party’s resurgence in the U.K. indicate that reports of social democracy’s death might be exaggerated.
Soon after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Georgia applied for membership in the EU. But it’s becoming increasingly unclear whether the current government under the Georgia Dream party is genuinely interested in joining the bloc. Some argue that, to the contrary, the party is intent on putting Georgia fully in Russia’s orbit.
The global spread of Italian food and wine as well as the popularity of Italy as a tourism destination—alongside the depiction of all three in popular culture—have helped establish the country as a “soft superpower.” Now a force largely outside of Rome’s control is threatening all three sectors: the climate crisis.