Unsafe at many speeds?
The Luxembourg summit launched the European Union’s expansion as well as settling another single-currency row. Behind both issues lurks the same question: can a multi-speed Union succeed?
IT WAS, proclaimed every European head of government on December 13th, a moving and historic moment: the reunification of Europe, the real end of the second world war. Such was the hyperbole surrounding the EU's long-expected decision to open talks with five aspiring members from Central and Eastern Europe—Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovenia and Estonia—plus Cyprus. In fact, the summit may have done as much to divide Europe as to unite it. It drew the first lines between the 11 countries likely to join the single currency in 1999 and the four, led by Britain, that will not. And it created a one-country ghetto for Turkey, which has been trying to move into Europe for over 34 years.
This article appeared in the Europe section of the print edition under the headline “Unsafe at many speeds?”
From the December 20th 1997 edition
Discover stories from this section and more in the list of contents
Explore the editionDiscover more
Emmanuel Macron shows off the gloriously restored Notre Dame
Five years after it was gutted by fire, the cathedral is more beautiful than ever
Ursula von der Leyen has a new doctrine for handling the hard right
The boss of the European Commission embarks on a second term
Marine Le Pen spooks the bond markets
She threatens to bring down the French government, but also faces a possible ban from politics
The maths of Europe’s military black hole
It needs to spend to defend, but voters may balk
Ukraine’s warriors brace for a Kremlin surge in the south
Vladimir Putin’s war machine is pushing harder and crushing Ukrainian morale
Vladimir Putin fires a new missile to amplify his nuclear threats
The attack on Ukraine is part of a new era of missile warfare