EU leaders clash over top Brussels jobs
European leaders launched a summer of wrangling over their union’s political direction on Tuesday with a clash over nominations for Brussels’ top job.
After dinner in Brussels, Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel left saying she stood by her centre-right group’s candidate to lead the European Commission for the next five years.
“We stand by our lead candidate, the EPP candidate, that is Manfred Weber. Others stand by their candidate, which is obvious,” Merkel told reporters.
But President Emmanuel Macron of France said the shifting political balance in the European Parliament after last week’s election had broken the “prison” of the candidacy process.
“The key is that the people in the most sensitive posts share in our project and are as charismatic, inventive and competent as possible,” he said.
France -- backed by progressive allies like Spanish premier Pedro Sanchez -- wants a candidate who could support the programme of a broader alliance of liberal, social democratic Green and centre-right MEPs.
The president of the European Council, Donald Tusk, will now go away and try to draw up a list of nominees for top EU roles that a majority of leaders could get behind at a June 21 summit.
If they fail find consensus, the debate will drag on, as it did in 2014, when it took several summits to agree on all the top jobs.
Alongside the Commission role, the leaders also have to choose a new Council president, a foreign policy chief, a speaker for the European Parliament and a central bank director.
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