Former President of the European Parliament, the German Martin Schulz, 66, has bad memories of a ritual that he had to perform every Wednesday, when he met with the leaders of political blocs in the House. This is because a constant figure in the meetings was the French Marine Le Pen, who commanded a grouping of radical right parties from several countries.
Today, she is the third time candidate for president of France, with a real chance of reaching the second round and reducing President Emmanuel Macron’s advantage in the polls. The first round will be played this Sunday (10).
A victory for Le Pen, says Schulz, would be a disaster for the European Union. “It’s a threat, and the open question is the room for manoeuvre. If it tried to get France out of the European Union, it would be a form of suicide. It would destroy the EU and it would also destroy France,” he says.
One of the main leaders of the German left, Schulz presides over the Friedrich Ebert Foundation, linked to the SPD, the party of Prime Minister Olaf Scholz. In São Paulo to participate in an event with former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) —whom he hopes to see victorious in the election—, he spoke to sheet last Tuesday (5).
The politician was an MEP for 23 years and even led the Social Democrats, a condition in which he faced then-Prime Minister Angela Merkel in the 2017 general election; his party at the time was a distant second, with 20.5% of the votes.
In the interview, he praises the response that Germany and the EU are giving to the war in Ukraine and says that the accusations that the country has protected Russian Vladimir Putin in recent years, due to economic and energy relations, are unfair.
A former bookseller and leftist since his youth, Schulz boasts on his CV that he was compared to a “Nazi concentration camp guard” by then Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi in a debate in the European Parliament in 2003, an episode that caused block protests. Still, he says the current far right is more dangerous than it was two decades ago.
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like mr. Do you see the possibility of Lula’s victory and what would be the impact on relations between Brazil and Germany? It is obvious that the current president of Brazil in no way shares our vision of international relations. His philosophy is of a one-sided strategy, completely different from what the new German government is working on.
In the case of the trade agreement between the European Union and Mercosur, is there the possibility of incorporating topics such as the climate agenda, for example? The agreement with Mercosur is one of the most important for the European Union’s economic and international relations. A precondition is to know if the content is really compatible with the needs of our time. There is an ecological issue in the post-COP [conferência do clima].
And a second element is whether multinationals from Europe consider this agreement a tool to become more competitive, because their investments in Latin America, for example, or in Brazil would lead to lower standards for the environment, lower wages and lower rights. of unions. In that case, you will never have a majority in the European Parliament for that, or in some of the member countries. So I’m not sure at this point that we’re as far along as we should be for it to be ratified immediately.
Mr. Would you say that a reelection of Bolsonaro would make this process more difficult? My fear is that the image of Brazil during President Bolsonaro’s term has suffered a lot. If I see our strategy in Europe against Covid and Bolsonaro’s, they are completely incompatible. His performance does not contribute to cooperation with other parts of the world, but this is linked to the free choice of a nation.
like mr. assess the EU’s response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine? And specifically Germany, which has always been considered one of the countries closest to Russia and Putin? This is a debate around the world, and it surprises me. If I declare that the betrayed are to blame, then I absolve the betrayal. Until the last minute, international diplomacy — not only German, but also American, French, British, Italian — tried to avoid these military steps. I was in Moscow in November and I met the minister [das Relações Exteriores Serguei] Lavrov, who told me: “Give me a reason why we should invade that country”. And now we have a debate that those people who were betrayed by the Russians are responsible for the war. It’s a strange debate.
There is a lot of criticism of the way the Nord Stream 2 pipeline was negotiated, that it would have been very favorable to Putin. like mr. sees ex-premier Gerhard Schröder’s relationship with Russia [O polÃtico é membro do conselho de administração da Rosneft e da Gazprom]? Isn’t something embarrassing for your party? When I was a kid in the 1960s, the biggest news was that Mannesmann, a big steel company, sold pipes to the Soviet Union to send gas to Germany. The gas trade between Germany and Russia is 60 years old. It was always serious for both sides.
Now Putin is breaking all the rules. Why did Schröder become director of Nord Stream 2? This is a company that includes Germans, Dutch and Russians. Russians with 51%, Europeans with 49%, but the chairman of the board was European. And it was Angela Merkel who suggested the name Schröder, as she was the one who had the best relationship with Putin at that time. Then he became director of [petrolÃfera russa] Rosneft. I asked him to drop the idea, that was public.
Another point is that until 30 years ago half of our country belonged to the Soviet Empire. The concentration camps in 1945 were liberated by the Red Army. But these facts do not change my opinion of Putin. There is no single justification for this war. We need to support Ukraine, increase defense spending, as Scholz did, and strengthen NATO’s strategy.
O Mr. Do you think that everything that could be done is being done to help Ukraine or is there something more? Everything is being done. I also share the point of view of those who say that if we really want to help the Ukrainians efficiently, we are not going to publish the strategy on the Folha de S.Pauloat the [alemão] Der Spiegel or not [francês] Le Monde. There are things going on. The Russians are not publishing their strategy. Why would we do the same? It would be innocent.
We are days away from the first round of the French election. Would a victory for Marine Le Pen pose an existential threat to the European Union? Yes. I know her well. She was a group leader in the European Parliament and I had to coordinate that group every Wednesday, terrible times for me. It is a threat, and the open question is room for manoeuvre. If she tried to get France out of the European Union, it would be a form of suicide. It would destroy the EU and it would also destroy France.
The far right is stronger now or at the time that Mr. been to the European Parliament? They are stronger today. look at your president [Bolsonaro]which was elected with the same instruments as [Donald] Trump [nos EUA], [Viktor] Orban [na Hungria] or [Recep] Erdogan [na Turquia]. They all have the same strategy: to question the legitimacy of their opponents with internet tools and to try to delegitimize institutions and, above all, independent justice. And it’s working.
Let’s be honest, leftist movements have so far failed to develop a coherent, global response to this. But there is hope. All these parties are very nationalistic, and sooner or later their interests become incompatible with those of their regional allies. Hungary, for example, was very close to Poland. Now Poland invites refugees from Ukraine and Hungary negotiates with Putin. The friendship is over. The left’s internationalist interests are greater.
Should the Brazilian left position itself more clearly on the war in Ukraine? I understand that it is more difficult for a BRICS country to move away from Russia than other countries. But I noticed that even President Bolsonaro voted in favor of a UN resolution [na Assembleia-Geral] against Russia, so I believe that the leftist movement in Brazil will definitely, completely, condemn any military action against a sovereign country.
Germans are known for building political coalitions, like the current one. What can you teach others in this moment of extreme polarization? The Brazilian parliamentary system is very particular. Ours has strong prime ministers, but they are closely linked to a parliamentary majority. It’s the first time liberals, greens and reds have come together. Economic and environmental issues are difficult, but a very important element. The sign that a right-wing party is joining the coalition is a sign that Germans want to see parties respecting the Constitution. The message is: in Germany the government has shown respect for national and international institutions.
x-ray | Martin Schulz, 66
Born in Eschweiler, he attended high school and in his youth was a book seller and worked at a publishing house. In his political career, he was an MEP (1994-2017), leader of the center-left group in the European Parliament (2004-12), President of the European Parliament (2012-17) and leader of the SPD party (2017-18). He has been president of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation since 2020.
