EU liberals open door to Flemish separatists

BRUSSELS - Alde, the liberal group in the EU parliament, has cleared the way for the Flemish-separatist N-VA party to join its ranks.

It took the decision at a meeting in Brussels on Tuesday (17 June) in a vote in which the Belgian MR party of former EU commissioner Louis Michel i was the only Alde faction to vote against the move.

For its part, the N-VA is expected to make up its mind at a congress on Wednesday morning.

If it says Yes, it is likely to see Alde retain its position as the third largest political group in the EU assembly with 71 MEPs.

The liberals’ British, German, and Italian delegations took a hammering in the May elections.

But Tuesday’s vote also swelled its ranks by accepting 13 new MEPs from the Czech Republic, Germany, Portugal, and Spain.

The MR voted against N-VA because they are opponents on the Belgian political scene.

N-VA believes the wealthier, Flemish-speaking north of Belgium should split from the poorer, French-speaking south, while the MR wants to keep the country united. But both see eye-to-eye on economic policy and on EU integration.

Meanwhile, the addition of the new Spanish MEPs had threatened to see two existing Alde members, from the Spanish separatist Basque and Catalan regions, leave.

But the prospect of the N-VA joining the ranks, a widely-expected result, saw the Spanish separatists decide to stay.

“Today’s vote means that if they [N-VA] choose to submit an application, then we, in principle, have no objections,” an Alde source said.

“Verhofstadt has managed to square the circle to work on European issues and not to get bogged down in Spanish or Belgian institutional issues,” he added, referring to Alde leader and fromer Belgian PM Guy Verhofstadt i.

The N-VA's EU affairs spokesman could not be reached for a comment.