Press

Simon Tilford, from the Centre for European Reform, said President Francois Hollande is almost certain to ditch EU fiscal targets after the weekend shock. “There is not going to any fiscal tightening before the elections,” he said.

"Osiągnięcie szybkiego porozumienia jest niemożliwe, ale Londynowi zależy na zbliżeniu stanowisk z Polską" - mówi PAP Agata Gostyńska-Jakubowska z think tanku Centre for European Reform.

As Simon Tilford of the Centre for European Reform has argued, the worst-paid Britons have been made worse off, too. Their real incomes have fallen, and an inadequate supply of housing has pushed up accommodation costs.

Rem Korteweg, a senior research fellow with the CER, told Anadolu Agency that last Sunday's EU-Turkey summit showed that the European Union needed Turkey as much as Turkey needed the EU. "For Europe these days all roads lead to Ankara," Korteweg said, adding that Turkey was the "key country" for matters ranging from the refugee crisis to counter-terrorism measures, and from the Syrian civil war and energy security to relations with Russia.

Charles Grant, the director of the CER warned that Downing Street was risking a major miscalculation about the extent to which key EU countries would bend in order to keep Britain in.

"Even if the Visegrad nations can be persuaded politically to accept this, anybody can go to the ECJ and say 'I'm being discriminated against'," said Charles Grant, director of the CER, a pro-European think-tank.

"These countries suffer from oligarchic, corrupt systems which have held back their development over the last 20 years, and one question is whether the kind of relationship the EU is offering them gives some kind of leverage to those who like to see cleaner government," says Ian Bond, director of foreign policy at the CER.

Charles Grant, director of the CER, sees a congruence of interests between far-right anti-immigrant politicians and the Islamic State. Grant argues that jihadist militants want to provoke far-right politicians like Le Pen, leader of France's National Front, who even before the attacks was riding high in opinion polls.

Charles Grant, director of the CER warned that Islamic State wanted its attacks to bolster far-Right politicians like Marine Le Pen, the National Front leader who looks poised for a major victory in France's regional polls this December.