By Nawab Khan
BRUSSELS, Oct 5 (KUNA) -- A series of accumulating crises to batter the European Union - such as Ukraine, Greece, migrants - without solving any one of them have exposed deep national divisions in the continent posing a serious threat to the dream of building a united Europe.
The crisis in Ukraine that led to the Russian occupation of Crimea has seriously affected EU-Russia relationships and put into question Russia's future military and political aspirations in Europe. The recent Russian military intervention in Syria is bound to worsen the crisis in the EU-Russia ties.
The severe debt and financial crisis in Greece led to fears of the country's exit, known as Grexit, from the euro zone and near collapse of the euro.
Analysts are warning that the political and financial crisis in Greece which held its second election in September this year is not over and they warn that the nightmare of a Grexit might surface anytime again.
The Greek crisis was followed by a more severe refugee crisis which has damaged the European integration process and put a serious threat to one of the most cherished achievements of the merger; freedom of movement within the Schengen visa-free travel zone.
Pleas by EU leaders for the adoption of a common European approach in handling the migrants crisis has fallen on deaf years with a number of EU countries like Austria, Germany, Belgium, Hungary, the Netherlands re-instating border controls and some EU states adopting national rules and regulations in dealing with it.
Some 25 years ago, when the Berlin Wall came down, European leaders proudly proclaimed the slogan "no more walls again". But several European countries are today building walls again, showing fragmentation of the European integration process.
Hungary has now built a high fence along its 175-kilometer border with Serbia to prevent mainly Syrian and Iraqi refugees from entering the country. The UK is building a new fence around the Channel Tunnel terminal in Calais, France, for the same reason. Bulgaria has also started constructing a fence along its border with Turkey to stop human traffickers from smuggling migrants to Europe.
Besides, the world watched in sheer amazement and disbelief how European countries were quarreling with each other on the acceptance of quotas to distribute the 160,000 refugees in a Union with a population of 507 million.
Analysts point out that TV pictures and video clips showing ill-treatment of thousands of refugees, in particular in Hungary and Greece, and the attack on refugee shelter homes in Germany have dealt a serious blow to EU claims of being a global champion of human rights and tolerance.
Observers opine that it is very easy for Europeans to preach to others on respect of human rights and tolerance, but the lessons are quickly forgotten and overlooked in time of crises and emergencies in Europe itself.
Europe was still struggling to deal with the migrant crisis when another full-blown scandal linked with the German car-maker Volkswagen exploded. The cheating of the Volkswagen's pollution emissions tests in the US and Europe has cast a dark cloud over the whole car industry. The fraud has also dealt a severe blow to Germany's "clean image" which it was trying to promote globally.
Moreover, the recent victory of independent-seeking parties in the region of Catalonia in Spain has led to threats to bar Catalonia from the EU and the euro zone if it separated from Spain.
Furthermore, the possibility of a Brexit, an abbreviation of "British exit", the possibility of UK's withdrawal from the EU in a referendum expected to take place in 2017 could lead to the collapse of the Union itself, warn analysts.
Analysts are of the view that the EU's foreign policy agenda would be a major casualty of these crises with the 28-member Union being more and more engaged in dealing with its internal problems and crises than with external issues and thus losing clout and influence to shape the global developments. (end) nk.rk