France, at war with terrorism, asks for solidarity from its EU partners

In an address to the French Congress yesterday, French President François Hollande told MPs and senators he was determined to “destroy” Islamic State (IS), French and international media report, while Prime Minister Manuel Valls warned that terrorists are planning attacks in several EU countries. France is at war with terrorism, said François Hollande. The French President revealed a series of strong security measures, pleaded for a grand international coalition and called for European solidarity.

He listed several demands to his EU partners: perform coordinated and systematic border checks, combat arms trafficking and approve the PNR by the end of the year, Les Echos and others reports. While calling for a radical overhaul of Europe’s border security policies, François Hollande warned that the continent would return to the age of “barbed wire and fences” if his demands for major security reforms were not met, The Daily Telegraph notes, stressing that the French President laid down the gauntlet to Brussels to adopt a series of controversial security reforms that have long been blocked by civil liberties campaigners and which will stretch the Schengen agreement to its limits.

While admitting, in an opinion piece in Les Echos, that it is legitimate to wonder what Europe has been doing to combat terrorism after France was hit twice in less than a year, ALDE MEP Sylvie Goulard stresses that the EU has been doing “what its member states have agreed to let it do”. The EU has too few prerogatives in the field of defence notably, and member states have proved reluctant or unable to conduct joint operations, for historical or strategic reasons, Ms Goulard states, adding that we are “paying the price” for the lack of political will to grant Europe the powers to make a difference.

The time for “neutrality or hesitations” is over, she adds. European partners now need to move forward together, in the respect of rule of law, Ms Goulard insists, adding that “at least part of the solution lies in Brussels.” EU Foreign Affairs Ministers, who met yesterday, actually see the need for more coordination, L’Unità reports, while EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy EC Vice-President Federica Mogherini is quoted as saying that the Paris attacks require EU countries to unite forces, share information and pool their efforts, including military efforts.

According to Les Echos, the most concrete measures France will take will be taken on the domestic front, even though it requires increased spending. The state of emergency will be extended by three months, and the French President advocated amending the Constitution. A series of legislative proposals was put on the table to bolster security, and the suspension of defence job cuts was announced until 2019. According to Sciences Po Professor Stéphane Rozès in L’Opinion, the French President is using the people’s emotion and widespread support for bolstered security to increase his powers and make major choices. “François Hollande’s decision to make security prevail over economic policy is somehow a way to put politics back at the centre of the European debate,” Mr Rozès says, while German media insist on the need to find the right responses to the threats from IS.

One of the assassins of the Paris attacks is said to have entered Europe as a refugee, notes SZ. The Syrian passport found next to the dead body of one of the Paris terrorists has built the case of European political leaders claiming that the migrant wave is a Trojan horse, facilitating the infiltration of jihadists, El País writs. Some, including Thomas de Maizière, however say that the connection between terrorism and refugee crisis could have been staged, SZ notes. Already on Sunday, EC President Jean-Claude Juncker said in Antalya that the refugees are fleeing from those forces responsible for the terror attacks in Paris; “this is why we have no reason to reconsider the European refugee policy,” he added.

Writing on the Telegraph‘s website, Dan Hannan criticises Jean-Claude Juncker’s reaction to the attacks in an article called “Eurocrats are in tragic denial about the Paris attacks.” While for EU leaders the answer to every problem is always “more Europe”, voters, Dan Hannan argues, are increasingly taking the opposite view, which shows that the European project is “collapsing in front of us.”

Catherine Day, special adviser to Jean-Claude Juncker, received the European of the Year 2015 award from European Movement Ireland in Dublin on Monday and said that she hoped that the Paris attacks would not mark the end of the Schengen agreement, The Irish Times reports. Although a lot of people are worried that this is the end of Schengen, it may only be temporarily restricted, said Catherine Day. The Schengen agreement is likely to be immediately revised, but member states will resist a complete revision, says former state secretary for European Affairs Paulo Gorjã in Portuguese media.