Tag Archives: European Union (EU)

Solving Problems

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Before you are able to solve a problem, it’s a good idea to find the source of the problem. If you are unable to acknowledge the source, chances are you won’t be able to solve the problem! That is the place some of the leaders of European countries find themselves in relation to supplying energy to their countries.

On Wednesday, The Conservative Treehouse reported:

They stopped their oil and gas exploration. They chose to chase ‘net zero’ academic pontifications. They closed their refining operations. They took apart their coal-fired electricity plants. They disassembled their nuclear power capabilities. Then, the absolute cherry on the proverbial cake, they voted to stop purchasing oil and gas from Russia.

The EU is now in the Find Out stage of their FAFO positioning.

Gasoline prices have skyrocketed. The last shipments of jet fuel have arrived. Major airline carriers are cancelling flights due to lack of fuel. Faster than the EU can organize meetings to discuss their position, EU destined LNG shipments have diverted to southeast Asia and India as the ASEAN nations bid higher purchase prices for the vessels literally on the water.

The article quotes EU Politico:

“Germany’s Friedrich Merz warns the economic fallout from the war in Iran is on track to rival that of the Covid pandemic or the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

[…] With the war in Iran threatening to choke off energy flows for the foreseeable future, Europe is facing a supply shock that promises to cripple manufacturing, ground airlines, hike up the price of food, spike borrowing costs and send inflation spiraling back to crisis levels.

As the last tankers carrying fossil fuels from the Persian Gulf pull into European ports, the scale of what is about to hit seems to be dawning on the continent’s leaders.

“I’m living with the reality of this war and its consequences 24 hours a day,” Italian Defense Minister Guido Crosetto told the La Repubblica newspaper. “I’m forced to know things that don’t let me sleep.” The conflict could last “years,” Christine Lagarde, the president of the European Central Bank, warned in an interview with the Economist last week. The long-term effects, she added, are “probably beyond what we can imagine at the moment.”

The war in Iran is not their problem–their own refusal to develop their own fossil fuel resources is their problem. Thank God for President Trump and his American energy independence agenda! We can help them out, but we can’t do everything for them.

Stopping The Funding Of Terrorism

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On Tuesday, The Jerusalem Post posted an article about the funding of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). There are some serious questions about the agency’s relationship to terrorists and terrorism.

The article reports:

European Parliament members from 16 of its 27 member states have called on the EU to cease funding UNRWA over its ties to terrorist groups and lack of commitment to peace.

The EU gives about €80 million-€90 million in funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East each year.

The MPs from Sweden, Germany, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Spain, the Netherlands, France, Cyprus, Romania, Denmark, Austria, Slovenia, Slovakia, Latvia, Finland, and Portugal wrote to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Monday, expressing their concerns about UNRWA.

Amid the somewhat rocky ceasefire and future of the Gaza Strip, the MPs said it was essential for support to be channeled through partners that share values of peace and reject “the forces of hate.”

UNRWA does not share those values and instead has “shown serious breaches of trust, including staff members connected to Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad,” the MPs wrote.

The article concludes:

“According to the UN’s own investigation, nine UNRWA employees participated in Hamas’s attack on October 7,” he (Danish MP Henrik Dahl) wrote.

UNRWA’s headquarters in Gaza were located on a Hamas base with server rooms and a 700-meter-long tunnel, and the terrorist organization used UNRWA schools and warehouses as hiding places for weapons and even Israeli hostages, Dahl said.

“After everything that has now come to light, no one can any longer claim that UNRWA is a ‘neutral humanitarian actor,’” he wrote.

UN Watch Executive Director Hillel Neuer praised the coalition of EU lawmakers.

“Bravo to European lawmakers from 16 countries for calling on the EU to support peace and reject hate by ending funding for terror-infested UNRWA,” he said.

In an article posted at rightwinggranny in October 2024, I noted that the leader of the October 7, 2023 attack worked for UNRWA. I am not convinced that the United Nations is on the side of peace.