MIDDAY BRIEF, IN BRIEF

Today at Commission, new taskforce to aid migrants in Libya

The living conditions for migrants and refugees in Libya are ‘an outrageous problem,’ says Commission president.

On the agenda: Migrants and refugees in Libya.

On the podium: Commission deputy spokesman Alexander Winterstein.

Ahead of the midday briefing: The European commissioner for economic and financial affairs, Pierre Moscovici, presented a new plan for EU countries to tackle VAT fraud.

Migrants in Libya: In recent months, reports from NGOs, media outlets and international agencies have highlighted the poor living conditions of migrants and refugees in Libya, including a recent report by CNN suggesting there are migrant slave auctions. Winterstein reiterated what Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker had said in Ivory Coast during the summit between the European Union and the African Union. For Juncker, the situation in Libya for migrants and refugees “is an outrageous problem which dates back to another century. This is neither conceivable nor acceptable for Europe to close its eyes to this tragedy — a daily tragedy for so many people, children, women, men in Libya.”

Click Here: COLLINGWOOD MAGPIES 2019

A new taskforce: Winterstein said that along with the United Nations and the African Union, the Commission will set up a new joint task force to boost voluntary returns of migrants and refugees stranded in Libya. The taskforce aims to provide more protection for migrants as well as improvements to their living conditions in the country. It will also coordinate with Libyan authorities on the resettlement of those in need of international protection.

Commission gets tough on air quality improvement

Brussels has set a hard deadline to show compliance of the EU’s air quality standards.

Brussels has set a hard deadline for Germany, France, Italy, Spain and the U.K. to show how they intend to comply with the EU’s air quality standards or face court action.

In a letter to German Environment Minister Barbara Hendricks, the European Commissioner for the Environment Karmenu Vella demanded to know by January 30 “how and by when you intend to achieve compliance [with the relevant air quality directives].”

POLITICO obtained a copy of the letter, dated Tuesday, January 16. According to an EU official familiar with the matter, similar letters on the lack of compliance with nitrogen dioxide standards were sent to the ministers of France, Italy, Spain and the U.K., as well as to countries in breach of particulate matter limits — Romania, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia (and Italy and France again).

If the countries don’t respond, “the Commission will proceed to the next step of the infringement procedure, namely referral to the Court [of the European Union],” Vella wrote.

Click Here: collingwood magpies 2019 training guernsey

“In light of the seriousness and the urgency of this issue and due to the lack of sufficient progress in ensuring compliance with air quality standards,” Vella invited the ministers of all the affected EU countries to a 9 a.m. meeting in Brussels on January 30, which he said “should be considered as the last opportunity to show the steps being taken to redress the situation.”

He added: “Please confirm your participation using the attached form by 23 January.”

This article is part of POLITICO’s new Sustainability coverage, tracking issues including the circular economy, air and water pollution, nature protection and chemicals, and including the Sustainability Insights newsletter every Monday afternoon. Email [email protected] for more information.

Left-wing Hollywood activist Alyssa Milano stormed the Georgia General Assembly on Tuesday, blasting state lawmakers for what she described as “voting on what goes on inside my uterus” during a protest against the state’s fetal “heartbeat” abortion bill.

“These are the men voting on what goes on inside my uterus,” Alyssa Milano is seen telling reporters in footage shared to social media as she points to male Georgia state representative, who points out that the actress does not vote in his district.

Standing up to intense opposition from abortion rights groups, citizens, physicians groups, and even Hollywood celebrities, Georgia lawmakers gave final approval last Friday to a “heartbeat” abortion ban that would put restrictions on abortions in the state.

The proposal now heads to the desk of Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, who supports the bill. If enacted, it would be among the comprehensive abortion bans in the United States. The measure was approved by 92 votes, just one vote more than the majority needed to pass out of the 180-member House.

Women in Georgia can currently seek an abortion during the first 20 weeks of a pregnancy. A heartbeat can be detected in an embryo as early as six weeks, before many women know they are pregnant.

Republican Rep. Ed Setzler, the bill’s author, said it was a “commonsense” measure that seeks to balance “the difficult circumstances women find themselves in with the basic right to life of a child.”

The legislation also was opposed by the Writers Guild of America, which represents TV and film writers, and several Hollywood celebrities, who signed an open letter to Kemp in opposition. The letter, spearheaded by actress Alyssa Milano, includes signatures from Alec Baldwin, Amy Schumer, Gabrielle Union, Ben Stiller, Don Cheadle, Mia Farrow, and others.

“We cannot in good conscience continue to recommend our industry remain in Georgia if H.B. 481 becomes law,” the letter reads.

In a press conference Tuesday, Milano told reporters that the movie business wants to continue doing business in the Peach State. “We want to stay in Georgia. We want to continue to support the wonderful people and the wonderful businesses in the Peach State. But we will not do so silently,” the actress said, reported Greg Bluestein of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

The threat is significant because Georgia is a burgeoning production hub for TV and film, with 455 productions shot in Georgia in fiscal year 2018, representing $2.7 billion in direct spending in the state.

Republican lawmakers in Tennessee, Florida, South Carolina, and Ohio are pursuing similar legislation, while Republican governors in Mississippi and Kentucky have recently signed heartbeat abortion bans.

If signed and not blocked in court, the Georgia law would take effect Jan. 1, 2020.

Click Here: geelong cats guernsey 2019

Kemp applauded the legislature in a statement Friday.

“Georgia values life,” Kemp said of the bill. “The legislature’s bold action reaffirms our priorities and who we are as a state.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

Click:bearing manufacturer

Joy in bankville over Basel deal

Here’s why Mario Draghi is smiling.

FRANKFURT — A decade after the global financial meltdown, banking regulators from the world’s biggest economies on Thursday announced the final deal on capital rules that they hope will make banks safer.

Or at least less likely to unleash huge economic shock waves when they collapse.

The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision’s oversight board — the Group of Governors and Heads of Supervision, known as the GHOS — gave its green light to the new framework after a meeting in Frankfurt.

“It’s a great day,” said a beaming Mario Draghi, president of the European Central Bank who also heads the GHOS. “Today’s endorsement of the Basel III reforms represents a major milestone that … completes the global reform of the regulatory framework, which began following the onset of the financial crisis.”

Click Here: geelong cats guernsey 2019

Now, it is up to Basel Committee members — central banks and banking regulators from the world’s largest economies — to incorporate the standards into national law.

This was long in the making.

A deal on the so-called Basel III standards was initially targeted for the end of 2016, but global regulators were unable to agree on how to determine banks’ capital requirements, or the money they should have with their own un-borrowed funds to cover all kinds of risks.

The biggest — and so potentially the most systemically important — banks currently use their own internal models to calculate the minimum amount of capital they need to always hold. But the Basel Committee argued that internal models can be too easily gamed, as was the case when banks came up with too-low capital requirements in the run-up to the financial crisis. Regulators found that two banks with very similar lending portfolios could have wildly different capital requirements, with no obvious reason for the distinction.

The Basel Committee therefore introduced proposals for calculating capital requirements based on a standard, regulator-set methodology commonly referred to as the “output floor.” This refers to the threshold below which a bank’s capital requirements cannot go when calculated using its own internal model.

US-EU standoff

The wrestling match over capital requirements pitted principally EU against U.S. regulators.

The Americans argued for more stringent requirements. The Europeans claimed American banks would not be hit as hard by any potential floor as their businesses are less reliant on bank loans and more on capital markets. In addition, European banks keep potentially risky mortgages on their balance sheets, while U.S. banks offload them to government agencies.

EU regulators echoed European banks’ arguments that a high output floor would force them to hold too much capital, resulting in increased costs for them and ultimately for their corporate and retail borrowers. And if that squeezes the amount of capital available in the system, they argued that economic growth would suffer.

Some regulators were also concerned that the reduced reliance on internal models would do away with “risk sensitivity” — in other words, using a regulator-set, standardized approach may not sufficiently take into account the likelihood of a customer defaulting and prompt institutions to lend to more risky clients.

Speaking at the end of November, Andreas Dombret, an executive board member of Germany’s Bundesbank, said the floor was too high and would “diminish” risk sensitivity. But he hinted Germany was willing to support the compromise anyway, a sign of the EU backing down from previous positions.

With the constant back-and-forth between EU and U.S. representatives and the repeated failure to get an agreement, there were growing doubts whether the Basel Committee would ever reach one. Talks were also held up by the election of U.S. President Donald Trump and the months it took for Randal Quarles to take up his position as the Federal Reserve’s vice chair of supervision, which left the U.S. without a negotiator.

But the output floor remained the thorniest issue. The EU stood firm on its desire for a 70 percent floor, while the U.S. pushed for a 75 percent floor.

Ultimately, they met half way — at 72.5 percent. The floor will be phased in over five years, starting in 2022.

“We should understand this is a compromise,” said Draghi. “There were members who wanted higher level, members who wanted lower.”

But this now leaves European banks to frantically calculate exactly what the final deal will mean for their businesses.

According to an impact study carried out by the European Banking Authority, the most systemically important banks in the EU would see their capital requirements rise on average by 15 percent. For the entire EU sample used in the study, which comprised 88 European institutions, the average minimum required capital would increase by 12.9 percent.

Speaking to reporters in Brussels, Valdis Dombrovskis, the European Commission vice president for financial services, said “we’ll need to consider the specificities of the European economy in terms of the banking sector and its role in financing the economy.”

‘Much-needed certainty’

Banks generally welcomed the final deal, despite their earlier pushback. Mark Gheerbrant, head of risk and capital at the International Swaps and Derivatives Association, said it provided “much-needed certainty for the industry.”

With global standards now set, work has only just begun for national regulators. Basel rules are not legally binding, and have to be writen into national laws. For the EU, this will mean a new legislative proposal, plus the usual scrutiny from the European Parliament and Council.

Ultimately, not everything that has been decided at the Basel level may trickle down into EU law. If European banks find that today’s agreement doesn’t work for them, the huge lobbying push will begin again — and may be more successful, given that they have the sympathy of many EU officials in Brussels and national ones in European capitals.

And new rules certainly don’t mean there won’t be any new banking crises.

“Nothing is crisis-proof,” said Draghi, but “[we can] clearly see the present system is much more resilient than the one we had before the crisis.”

His sentiments were echoed by Stefan Ingves, chairman of the Basel Committee: “My belief is that we’re in better shape once this is implemented but at the same time, it’s impossible to know what the future has in store.”

For the Basel Committee’s big guns, however, Christmas has come early. At the press conference announcing the news, the normally dour Draghi could hardly contain his excitement at finishing the 10-year regulatory marathon, saying he was “pleased and proud.”

Bjarke Smith-Meyer in Brussels contributed reporting.

France tells Trump a trade war won’t go his way

Trade secretary says US president will find American consumers turn against him in any escalation of hostilities.

France has a message for Donald Trump: America’s aggressive, go-it-alone tariff tactics are doomed.

Speaking to POLITICO, French Trade Secretary Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne warned that the U.S. president risks igniting a trade war by imposing tariffs on steel and aluminum, but insisted that his strategy would backfire.

“We are entering an era where trade war is starting to show its teeth. And we think that’s not good news,” Lemoyne said in an interview in a Brussels hotel. “American politics today — unilaterally putting in place a regime of additional tariffs on steel and aluminum — comes on the heels of a policy which aims to gut the dispute settlement system of the World Trade Organization.”

The U.S. president is using the threat of tariffs to pressure trading partners into new trade arrangements with Washington that he hopes will help slash America’s yawning deficit. Mexico and Canada, for example, have only escaped duties on the condition that they strike a new version of the North American Free Trade Agreement that will tilt the balance of trade more in America’s favor.

When asked whether the EU would make any concessions, Lemoyne retorted that there was no way the EU, the world’s largest trade group, would be strong-armed into reviving a transatlantic trade agreement.

In part, he explained, it was impossible to resurrect the idea of a transatlantic trade deal because Trump had quit the Paris agreement on climate change. That has become a red line for new EU trade deals, at France’s insistence.

“We have said that to strike trade agreements, this must be done with countries whose governments are party to the Paris agreement,” he said. “Potentially blocking us on steel and aluminum to force a free trade deal is not the right way.”

Trouble on the home front

Lemoyne also stressed that Trump’s tariffs would come back to bite the American economy. Beyond tariffs of 25 percent on steel and 10 percent on aluminum, the president is proposing a broader policy of reciprocity. That would mean lifting tariffs on, say, European cars because the EU imposes higher duties on motor vehicles than the U.S. does.

While Lemoyne said Europe stood ready to retaliate directly against targeted U.S. products, he argued that Trump would be deterred from a broader trade war when an arms’ race over tariffs ramped up prices for American consumers.

“This escalation in taxes and tariffs isn’t good for the American consumer,” said Lemoyne.

He added that recent U.S. tariffs on Canadian soft-wood lumber exports meant that American importers continued to import the Canadian wood but passed on the higher price to consumers. “In reality this type of measure can turn against the Americans themselves,” he said.

Lemoyne also insisted that Trump would fail in his attempt to disable the World Trade Organization as the global forum to resolve trade disputes. The U.S. is vetoing the appointment of new judges in the WTO’s appellate court, in what the French minister and the European Commission say is an attempt to undermine the institution.

Lemoyne warned that France would push for the appellate court to continue its work despite Trump’s opposition.

“It is necessary to think about all the forms of Plan B, which make it possible to maintain … a mechanism for those states that are in favor of having it. Because there is still a very strong majority of WTO countries that wish to continue to have this type of dispute settlement.

“So I think that now we must actually start to be creative and therefore France will also … put proposals on the table to restore efficiency to the WTO both in its function as a developer of standards and in its function as a judge.”

French President Emmanuel Macron will discuss the trade tensions with Trump on his state visit to Washington next month, Lemoyne said.

In another sign that Europe is unwilling to roll over in the face of Trump’s threats, Lemoyne said that Paris would use the EU leaders’ summit on March 22-23 “to establish what we call a European chief enforcer, who would be charged with the power to activate all sorts of control mechanisms and retaliation measures.”

Such an enforcer, who would work in the European Commission’s trade department, “could also be a deterrent vis-à-vis certain partners who sometimes test the limits.”

Far-left Hollywood actress and activist Alyssa Milano has claimed she doesn’t have “equal rights under the constitution” as she urged lawmakers to pass legislation to amend the Constitution with the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) aimed at elevating women.

Milano made the remarks during an impassioned two-minute video after the first congressional hearing on the Equal Rights Amendment in 36 years.

Click Here: Rugby league Jerseys

“I don’t have equal rights under the Constitution… It is time for the constitution to reflect the powerful principles of its first three words: We the People,” Alyssa Milano said.  “The ERA will build a wall, a wall that will actually do something against the never-ending assault on our rights from the current or future presidents.”

“Ratification will make sure that all people, no matter where we fall on the spectrum of gender identity, will have sovereignty over our own bodies, at home and in the doctor’s office,” said the actress whose net worth ranges from a reported $10 to $45 million. “And it will change the face of business as companies enact recruitment, retention, and advancement programs that ensure a woman’s path to the executive suite does not stop at an executive assistant.”

Congress passed the ERA amendment back in 1972, although it fell short of the required 38 states needed to ratify it before the March 1979 deadline.

Alyssa Milano has long been involved in campaigning for the ERA. In January, she told a rally in Washington, D.C. on Tuesday that because she has a vagina, she doesn’t have “equality and justice” in America.

“My name is Alyssa Milano, and in 2019 I do not have equal rights in the Constitution,” she declared. “That’s right, because I have a vagina I do not have equality and justice.”

Her plea was also backed by fellow actress Patricia Arquette, who testified before the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties on Tuesday in favor of the amendment.

“I come here not as a constitutional lawyer but as an American citizen, as an American woman, to advocate for what I feel is critical for our country,” Arquette said. “Women have waited 232 years to be enshrined as full and equal citizens. Why? Because in 1787, women were left out of the Constitution intentionally.”

Follow Ben Kew on Facebook, Twitter at @ben_kew, or email him at [email protected].

Gibraltar will not be bullied into accepting joint sovereignty between the U.K. and Spain as a condition for being included in a Brexit transition period, the territory’s deputy chief minister, Joseph Garcia, said.

Spain has sought to reclaim sovereignty over Gibraltar from the U.K. for nearly 300 years, and the EU has effectively given Madrid veto authority over any provisions pertaining to the Rock in a Brexit agreement.

Anxiety among Gibraltar officials has deepened, however, since Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said in December he viewed that veto power as applying to a transition deal as well.

Garcia, in an interview with POLITICO at Gibraltar House in Brussels, said the territory would not be blackmailed into accepting joint sovereignty — a demand Spain has not issued but many in Gibraltar fear is inevitable. “What we don’t want to be in a position of, is where Spain gives us a price of joint sovereignty for maintaining a relationship with the European Union,” he said. “We are just not prepared to pay the price … We are not prepared to pay a price for normality.”

Gibraltar is one of several side issues in the Brexit process that could prove politically explosive and pose a serious obstacle to the agreement of a formal withdrawal treaty.

Officials on the British overseas territory also complain that the EU’s chief negotiator, Michel Barnier, has refused to meet with them — even though he has met on several occasions with some of the most ardent British supporters of Brexit, including Nigel Farage, as well as representatives of devolved nations of the U.K.

Garcia said he sees Spain’s hand in Barnier’s reticence. “I think it’s because Spain does not want us to go around spreading our message,” he said.

In its original Brexit negotiating guidelines, adopted last April, the European Council declared: “No agreement between the EU and the United Kingdom may apply to the territory of Gibraltar without the agreement between the Kingdom of Spain and the United Kingdom.” Asked about the current state of discussions with Gibraltar, a Commission spokesperson, referred back to this provision, adding: “As stated a number of times, there is full support amongst the EU27 for these guidelines.”

In December, after EU leaders gave the green light for Phase 2 of the Brexit talks, Rajoy said he expected the veto to apply to the terms of transition as well. That would suggest that in order for Gibraltar to be included in the transition — after the official Brexit date in March 2019 — the U.K. would have to reach a bilateral agreement with Spain as well as a transition deal with the EU.

In response, Gibraltar’s chief minister, Fabian Picardo, has declared that the territory retains its own veto power over a Brexit withdrawal treaty by virtue of its constitution and agreements with the U.K. that provide governmental autonomy in many policy areas.

“In circumstances where the withdrawal agreement will cover areas which fall outside of the U.K.’s sphere of competence vis-à-vis Gibraltar, most notably with regard to citizens’ rights … it is for HM government of Gibraltar and not for the U.K. government to agree to and implement in Gibraltar provisions of the withdrawal agreement for which HM government of Gibraltar is exclusively responsible for,” said Daniel D’Amato, a government spokesman. Gibraltar’s concerns are largely related to the movement of people, especially 13,000 EU citizens who work on the peninsula.

Garcia said residents of Gibraltar were dismayed that the EU27 had effectively outsourced their concerns to Madrid, especially because the territory voted so overwhelmingly to stay in the EU.

“I’d say more than sold out, or disenchanted,” Garcia said. “We thought the position taken was a slap in the face to that 96 percent that delivered a vote of confidence in the European ideal.”

Click Here: Rugby league Jerseys

Ratings for the Fox television show Empire are plummeting after its star, Jussie Smollett was arrested for apparently staging a fake hate crime attack against himself.

According to TheWrap, Empire fell a whole 29 percent in viewers from a comparable episode last year.

Indeed, Jussie Smollett’s hate hoax has stained the hit show so badly that there is even talk of cancelling it. The cast of Empire is reportedly worried that the show could be cancelled.

According to TMZ, “We’re told people who’ve been working on the show for years are griping they should’ve heard the news one way or another by now, and expected to get word on the fate of the show around 2 weeks ago.”

Following Smollett’s arrest, Fox put out a statement calling the 36-year-old a “consummate professional” and insisted that “he is not being written out of the show.”

PARIS — Emmanuel Macron knows by now that it was easier to become French president at 39 than to reform Europe.

From his failed bids to change the way the European Commission chief and Parliamentarians are chosen to his slow-moving eurozone reform plans, the French president’s difficulties on the European stage show the limitations of his style of politics. Ideas and energy alone aren’t enough to move the tired EU institutions, and his bet on a new Paris-Berlin alliance to transform Europe is hitting the wall of German inertia.

Macron’s European plan looked straightforward: Just as he had uprooted all basic rules of French politics to become president, he would take Brussels by storm. Carried by his youth, enthusiasm, political acumen, and with a bold French reform plan to prove he means business, he would bring the fresh air of change to the EU.

Europe would focus more on its citizens’ daily lives and make sure it would “protect” them. Reforms of the EU political process and monetary union would be implemented by a new generation of leaders eager to kick the habits of the past. And a new partnership between France and Germany would provide “the engine” of European reform.

But after an extended honeymoon when Europe was under the new French leader’s spell, the harsh reality of politics in Brussels and other capitals has begun to show up the limitations of Macron’s liberal revolution.

Remaking the eurozone will prove much harder than planned. Macron’s ideas to reform the European Parliament are bogged down in the sands of EU backroom dealings. And his audacious plans to create a pan-European party on the model of his own La République en Marche (LREM) have been put on hold.

Macron this week will spend most of his time trying to revive the European flame he first lit in a big speech last September at Paris’ Sorbonne university.

On Tuesday, he will have a discussion with MEPs in Strasbourg, then in the afternoon he will hold the first of many town hall meetings he has suggested take place in all EU countries on the topic of Europe.

And on Thursday, Macron travels to Berlin, where he will have four hours of talks with German Chancellor Angela Merkel on the main European topics of the moment, from the eurozone to the next long-term EU budget.

Macron’s friends and advisers deny that the French president is in any way disappointed by his European record so far — or even by the way the EU works. 

‘Not naïve’

A French foreign policy academic and occasional adviser to the president pointed out that when he outlined his bold plans for Europe in his Sorbonne speech, “Macron wasn’t naïve.”

“He knew what he was getting into,” said the academic, who didn’t want to be named. “You’re talking about a guy who knows the EU institutions well, came often to Brussels before he was elected, and is blessed with a keen political acumen. Not the dewy-eyed type.”

Another Macron adviser added: “Just because compromises are difficult to achieve doesn’t mean we must stop fighting. That has never been our approach.”

Yet almost a year after his election, Macron knows it will be more difficult to reform Europe than France.

In France, with no political opposition to speak of and the unflinching support of a massive and obedient parliamentary majority, Macron decides and acts. In Brussels, he must haggle and compromise.

Aides point out the achievements he can claim as his own. Ever since he took power, one of them said, his hyperactivity on the European stage has paid off. France’s voice matters again, after 10 years when the country’s haphazard diplomacy, coupled with the euro crisis, reduced it to a marginal role. And a year after his election, the French president is still the wonder-kid of European politics.

What’s more, a Macron aide said, “we got results.”

A French diplomat cited the changes enacted to tighten the Posted Workers Directive and the decision by European leaders to review regulations on foreign takeovers to make them tougher. Other achievements may “not be the type to make headlines,” the Macron aide said, mentioning progress on a plan to create a network of 20 European universities by 2024.

It hasn’t gone so well on other topics.

On the eurozone, the long power vacuum in Germany, where it took six months to form a government after an inconclusive election, didn’t favor in-depth negotiations between two countries with long-standing diverging approaches on the matter. But now that a proper team is in place in Berlin, it looks like normal service will be resumed and German reluctance to engage in significant risk-sharing will water down the mooted reform.

The year-long talks and speeches are likely to end in June with a set of minimalist measures falling way short of the comprehensive reform Macron had in mind for the monetary union, according to a top EU official: incremental progress on the banking union and maybe a deal on a small, common investment budget.

As for Macron’s ideas on how to reform the European Parliament, which holds elections in May next year, they’ve been smothered by the shock of national interests and political lobbies.

The French president suggested that a limited number of deputies be elected on a transnational basis. It won’t happen this time around.

He contested the Spitzenkandidaten process that allows the political parties in the Parliament to de facto choose the next European Commission president. It looks like the system, used for the first time in 2014 for the appointment of Jean-Claude Juncker, will survive.

Macron may well insist that the head of the winning list not be “automatically” designated as the next Commission president. But that’s the same legalistic view that Merkel used in 2014 to oppose, in vain, the appointment of Juncker.

The French president also planned an alliance of his own LREM movement with other like-minded European parties. The problem is that the parties close to him lose elections, while those who win aren’t close to him.

LREM would have liked to enter an alliance with Italy’s Democratic Party (PD), whose former leader Matteo Renzi was Italy’s prime minister from 2014 to 2016, and in some ways was a precursor of Macron. But the PD was trounced in the Italian parliamentary election last month.

Macron’s party doesn’t have any possible partner in Germany. Its only potential ally among Europe’s biggest parties is Spain’s Ciudadanos, currently polling ahead in the country.

No retreat

Even though the road to Brussels hasn’t been as smooth as he may have expected, there is little chance that Macron will retreat and tone down his calls for “in-depth transformation” of the way Europe works.

The first reason is that he doesn’t think the populist threat and Euroskepticism have subsided in Europe, and recent elections such as those in Italy and Hungary appear to prove him right.

“Everyone was celebrating last year because of what happened in the Netherlands or in France, but we haven’t forgotten that in the first round of the French presidential elections, Euro-hostile parties polled almost 50 percent of the vote,” the Macron aide said.

The second reason is that Macron thinks that global threats, from Russia’s assertiveness to a possible Trump-triggered trade war, should force Europe to get its act together and “strengthen the European democratic model currently under attack,” said his academic friend.

Finally, Macron built his presidential campaign on a promise to the French that he would make Europe not only more “protective,” but also stronger and more prosperous.

“Whatever the pitfalls and whatever the setbacks, we have no other choice than keep pushing,” the Elysée adviser said.

The Pescara head coach has recalled working alongside the mercurial Swede at Juve, describing him as the “strongest” of all his old team-mates

Click Here: Cardiff Blues Store

Nicola Legrottaglie has offered an insight into Zlatan Ibrahimovic’s winning mentality, insisting the striker would assure his team-mates that they would win as long as they were playing alongside him.

Ibrahimovic has enjoyed a hugely successful career spanning two decades, winning a whole host of major honours with nine different clubs.

The 38-year-old began his career in Sweden with Malmo, before making his name at Ajax, where he established himself as one of the most talented forwards in Europe.

More teams

He went on to play for Juventus, Inter, Barcelona, Milan, Paris Saint-Germain, Manchester United and LA Galaxy, racking up 449 career goals in total.

Ibrahimovic called time on his adventure in the MLS back in November and, after a month of intense transfer speculation, he ended up going back to San Siro in January.

The veteran frontman has returned to help Milan re-establish themselves as a force in Serie A after years of mediocrity and has already had a positive impact, scoring three goals in eight appearances.

Pescara boss Legrottaglie witnessed Ibrahimovic’s talents up close while he was on Juve’s books and says the Swede’s strength and confidence in his own ability are what sets him apart from his peers.

“The strongest player I played with is Ibrahimovic. The strongest of all,” Legrottaglie told  Il Centro .

“Once, when we were at Juve, he said to me: ‘Ibra makes you win titles, not Jesus’.”

Legrottaglie added on what he learned from his experience with the Bianconeri: “Juventus leaves a mark. Even if you don’t notice it, that environment marks you in a positive way.

“They inculcate your winning mentality. Sacrifice and work. When you then go to other clubs you understand why the world of Juventus is different.”

Juventus have a fight on their hands to retain the Scudetto this season, with Lazio and Inter both hot on their heels after 24 fixtures.

Maurizio Sarri’s men will aim to beat SPAL this weekend to maintain their advantage at the summit, before their focus switches to a Champions League tie against Lyon.

Milan, meanwhile, have fallen down to ninth in the Serie A standings but have won six of their last nine matches across all competitions.

Ibrahimovic will be back in contention for a place in Stefan Pioli’s line-up when the Rossoneri travel to Fiorentina on Saturday.