Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said on Thursday that Europe will have to work with whoever president US voters choose in the upcoming elections, warning simultaneously against telling people what they should do.
Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Mitsotakis was asked what he thinks, from a European perspective, of Donald Trump’s potential return to the US presidency.
“I’ve worked with both President Trump and Biden. At the end of the day, it would be rather inappropriate for any foreign leader to express their views on what is fundamentally a democratic process”, Mitsotakis replied.
“As Europe, we will have to work with whoever the American people choose to elect as their next President”, the Greek leader added.
Mitsotakis, who recently rejected rumours suggesting that he is eyeing a top EU job, opposed telling people what they should vote for, noting that sometimes doomsday scenarios have a reverse effect.
“We all have our preferences, but I think it’s probably best to keep it to ourselves”, he added.
The discussion over how Europe will handle a new Trump presidency started in Brussels.
Notably, EU Commission officials and member states have been exploring how to ‘Trump-proof’ the Brussels-Washington relationship, given the experience with the previous Trump administration.
A senior source from the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP) also recently confirmed to Euractiv that more consideration is being given to how to deal with a potential new Trump era and expedite the progress of legislation needed in specific fields, such as trade.
“Europe is examining all the key strategic moves that need to be made”, the EPP source said. “We have many unknowns such as the decoupling from China discussion, the Ukraine issue […] We need to be ready.”
Traditionally, US Democrats have been aligned with the EU’s liberals and centre-left and US Republicans with the EU centre-right (EPP).
However, with Trump at the helm, the US Republicans no longer have their traditional friends from the European People’s Party on board. Under the current EPP leadership, all relations with the Republicans have been frozen.
Moreover, the EU centre-right has also frozen its relationship with the International Democracy Union (IDU), which promotes conservative policies across the globe and supports Trump.
(Sarantis Michalopoulos | Euractiv.com)
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Source: euractiv.com
