Juncker dismisses superstate talk

European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker has said that he is “strictly against a European superstate” in response to UK foreign secretary Boris Johnson’s remarks in a speech made on Wednesday the BBC and other sources report. “Some in the British political society are against the truth, pretending that I am a stupid, stubborn federalist, that I am in favour of a European superstate,” Juncker said at a press conference when asked about Johnson’s speech. “We are not the United States of America, we are the European Union, which is a rich body because we have these 27, or 28, nations. The European Union cannot be built against the European nations, so this is total nonsense.”

Macron and Juncker at loggerheads

French president Emmanuel Macron has said that EU lawmakers have shown “an ossification and a willingness to defend party interests rather than democratic ones,” in response to a decision, backed by Jean-Claude Juncker, to abandon the idea of pan-European lists at next year’s European Parliament elections. Reuters reports that Macron has called for an alliance of centrist “reformists”, similar to those who formed his successful “En marche” movement in France, to join forces at the parliament in Strasbourg. “I think Europe would be better off democratically with a redrawing of the political map,” he said. Juncker, who has supported the continuation of the so-called “Spitzenkandidat” method for electing the next European Commission president, said that Macron’s failure to commit to existing political grouping in the EU parliament could lead to voters shunning his party.