
Europe





Analysis: Carola Rackete court victory a win for humanity over barbarism
Carola Rackete risked her own freedom to save others, and showed Brussels and Rome that it’s their policies towards those fleeing war and persecution – not search & rescue efforts – which are at odds with international law
ON TUESDAY [3 July], an Italian judge faced down the Italian Interior Minister and probably the most powerful man in Italy, Matteo Salvini, and ruled that the German captain of a search and rescue ship, Carola Rackete, had not broken the law in entering the port of Lampedusa on 29 June.


Analysis: Europe's far-right seek to make gains through a watered down Euroscepticism
The far right are likely to make significant gains in this week’s European elections
THIS week’s European elections (Thursday 23 May) are being billed as among the most important for the future course of the EU, and the wider politics of the continent, in decades.
The established power brokers are in crisis, the far right is on the rise, but is there much evidence of more progressive developments across the continent?
Bearing in mind the complexities of politics across Europe and the unreliability of polling, we can trace some key developments.

EU Elections In Perspective: The need to defend 'the idea of Europe' against the far-right
CommonSpace is interviewing political commentators from different perspectives on the EU ahead of European elections on 23 May. In the fourth interview, we speak to Marta Cillero Manzano and Ana Oppenheim of European Alternatives, which campaigns for a democratic and egalitarian European Union, about what we should expect from the EU elections across Europe.
CommonSpace: What impact is Brexit likely to have on the wider European dynamics?

Corporate capture of EU member-states in Brussels ‘very high’ and ‘getting worse’, think-tank finds
‘Captured States: When EU Governments are a channel for corporate interests’ challenges “nationalist rhetoric” which sees “blaming the EU ‘appartus’ alone” as a sufficient explanation of EU corporate power

Analysis: European governments are in no position to hand out lectures to Venezuela about people power
Governments across the EU, as well as the EU itself, have on Monday [4 February] declared Juan Guaido President of Venezuela, citing the need for democracy driven by protest – something they have not been so keen on closer to home
“PEOPLE are on the streets, people want change.”
That was the statement, made without a hint of irony, of French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, about why the French Government was now backing the coup in Venezuela.