Category: Uncategorized

Would you say that a woman’s life is worthless if she doesn’t have children? This seems inconceivable in a European country. But this is exactly what we are experiencing in Italy.

Under the new far-right government of Giorgia Meloni, the idea of supporting families goes hand in hand with propaganda, and that’s where problems arise for women.

Nothing explains it better than this sentence by Isabella Rauti, daughter of the founder of fascist Italian Social Movement party, Pino Rauti. In May, she spoke at the conference of Fratelli d’Italia, Meloni’s party, as a head of the Family department. She said: “Without children, without the joy of being continued, there is no future, there is nothing.”

Once in government, Meloni set up the Ministry of Natality, whose minister Eugenia Roccella has previously stated that abortion is “not a right”. This week, while launching the budget bill, the government prepared a reform to the pension system.

It allows earlier retirement to women who have more children. The more children you have, the earlier you can retire. What if you cannot or do not want to have children? Has your partner any role?

Behind the smokescreen of propaganda, the stark reality remains: women need a supportive welfare system and fair wages, otherwise there is little point in talking about family, traditional or otherwise.

Giorgia Meloni, who made being “a woman and mother” her brand, leads a party that voted against the equal pay directive in the EU. In Italy, her first obsession is dismissing the universal basic income. For now, the ability to help families seems “much ado about nothing”.

What happens when propaganda interferes in women’s lives has already been shown. After Fratelli d’Italia won local elections in the Marche region, the right to abortion was put under threat.

I come from a Catholic family. I have three sisters. But when I think about having children, what I see is the uncertainty of the future.

After the 2008 crisis, the Spanish labor market suffered a shock. What used to be ‘a company you always worked for’ transformed into unemployment queues. We received the ‘firing flexibility’ but without the perspective of a fast re-hiring in another company.

Now, if I don’t know whether I will still have a job in five years’ time, how am I going to embark on a long-term commitment like having a child?

When I hear drastic warnings about the shrinking of the European population, fears that Spain’s birth rate is among the lowest in Europe, or politicians blaming young women and their lifestyle for this situation: it’s always on women.

The blame for the decline in birth rates only falls on women joining the workforce (it’s true!), women wanting to focus on their careers (also true!) and even ‘selfish’ women trying to enjoy longer child-free years of youth (more truths!).

But when politicians address natality, it is never about housing, economic insecurity, the labor market, or the cost of living. Government policies should approach the problem in a holistic way. Unfortunately, it has always been a disappointment.

Instead of trying to convince me to have children, the Government could try to fix the housing market. After years of unstable employment, I was 27 years old when I got my first fixed contract. In Madrid, where I live, finding an affordable house with more than two rooms in a normal neighborhood is an ordeal. And forget about buying a place.

How could I think about having a child without a house to raise them? Let alone four kids, like my mother.

In Hungary, all married couples can access an interest-free loan of 24,500 Euro (or 10 Million HUF). No repayments are due for three years after the first child is born, 30 percent of the debt is waived after the second, and the entire debt is waived after the third.

Backed by the government slogan “family-friendly country”, this financial benefit is only valid as long as citizens fulfill their ‘domestic’ obligations.

If the couple divorces or has no children before their fifth anniversary, this support turns into a penalty: not only is the loan at market rate, but the couple must pay back the subsidized interest rate to the state.

“You are a part of our population growth problem,” Martin Helme, the current leader of the far-right Estonian party EKRE, told a 27-year-old female journalist in 2016.

She had asked him if it was wrong that she was not planning to have children at that time. He also called her a “socially harmful element”. This quote has since become infamous in Estonia’s ongoing baby debate.

Although this statement was condemned by liberals, it did not damage EKRE’s popularity. Since the fall of the Iron Curtain, Estonia has experienced a rapid decline in its birth rate.

However, Tallinn University demographer Mark Gortfelder has pointed out that the existential fear of demographic “survival” has existed longer than the 104-year-old-republic.

Estonia experiences the issue of survival more literally than in most other parts of Europe. Every regional power has at some point in history controlled the Baltic nation of today or a large chunk of it. Most of these periods have involved a massive loss of Estonian lives.

Estonia’s first period of de facto independence (1918 to 1940) was ended by World War II, and accompanied by mass killings and deportations. Between 1945 and 1989, migration increased the proportion of the non-Estonian population within the Soviet-controlled republic from 3% to 38%. It was feared that Estonians would soon be “a minority on their own land”.

For all these reasons, the “baby-making” narrative falls on fertile ground in Estonian politics.

For prime minister Kaja Kallas, this meant ditching her coalition partners who, together with EKRE, introduced a bill for a massive increase in family subsidies behind her back. Many experts say that these will not significantly increase the birth rate.

The price for Kallas to keep her job was high. Her new coalition partners demanded lavish subsidies for families. It was exactly because of those that the previous government was ousted.

On 9 November, the Day of Ukrainian Writing and Language, the annual “Dictation of National Unity” organized by the Ukrainian public broadcaster went viral. The reason why? – its topic hit too close to home.

In this radio, TV and online gathering, audiences are invited to write down the words to an essay correctly. The piece, by writer Iryna Tsilyk, was dedicated to the concept of home, which the Russian invasion has stolen from millions of Ukrainians.

Having fled the war or taken up arms to defend their country, many listeners found themselves away from home, and united in writing words about a place dear to their hearts.

“Sometimes a home can fit into the size of a suitcase. We now are like those snails, [we] know the price of large migrations,” reads the essay.

Many were moved to tears, including the TV anchor of the event, Roman Kolyada, whose house was demolished by Russia’s war. Social networks were full of crying faces and damp sheets of paper.

“Every time it’s like the next level in a computer survival game. Now there is no electricity or water supply, frightened employees don’t come to work. Or they show up, but can’t stand the pressure,” writes Anna Zavertaylo, co-owner of the popular Honey cafes in Kyiv.

Since the Russian strikes on Ukraine’s critical infrastructure, which started on 10 October, there have been daily power cuts in Kyiv to save energy. Anna’s business is trying to adapt. When the power is out, the confectioners wear headlamps, so they can continue making desserts.

It’s the same in many places for eating out. The Ornament cafe, after the blackouts started, initially offered a limited selection of drinks from its menu, such as filter coffee, which can be brewed in advance and stored in a thermos.

Now, after purchasing a small gas stove, all drinks are available. Kha.food, which sells Kharkiv traditional square pizza, announces its opening hours daily on social networks. The Greek restaurant Chaika warns that when there is no electricity, visitors can enjoy grilled dishes.

It is not only the catering industry that is adapting. Many units are buying diesel generators to keep them running in the event of a power cut. Kyiv businessman Ilya Kenigstein has bought a large generator to keep his business, Creative States coworking centers, running smoothly. Last week he sold out all the places for solo work, and there is a waiting list of teams who want to rent the offices.

“After the war broke out, we understood how important it was to stay here,” says Zavertaylo. “We are here to work, create and support each other. All these complications only transform our values. We have to walk this path, and they [the Russians] won’t break us.”

Daria remembers the night of 23 February as if it were yesterday. The 29-year-old film producer was sleeping in her spacious Kyiv apartment with the window open when sirens sounded. “I was annoyed because I thought it was a car alarm,” she says.

“I turned on my cell phone and my mother had posted a message on the family group in WhatsApp. ‘It’s started’, she said.” The first explosions struck the Ukrainian capital. “I was shocked, paralyzed. I took refuge in a shelter. I thought I would stay there for twenty minutes, but I spent two weeks without going outside,” adds Daria.

The Russian invasion triggered a trauma for her. “I started to feel very bad. I couldn’t sleep. I told myself that I had no choice but to leave.” On 18 March, Daria left Kyiv in a hurry with a small bag, “like a refugee”. Her destinations were Warsaw, then Geneva, then Paris. She had already studied cinema for five years in the French capital, and joined tens of thousands of Ukrainians who found refuge in France.

Daria put her bags down at a friend’s house, in the lively Buttes-Chaumont neighborhood.’For the first few days, she managed to rest a little. Her big blue eyes were tired from sleepless nights spent collecting money for the war effort or in the kitchens, where she prepared meals for Ukrainian soldiers.

But even in Paris, something seemed wrong. Despite her friends’ support, Daria felt alone in her struggle. “When I arrived, I found it hard to see people happy, to be in a country at peace when mine was at war,” she says. Daria tried by all means to inform the French about the situation in Ukraine.

She participated in all the demonstrations, organized solidarity dinners, and covered herself with fake blood to try to alert the population. She never went out without her Ukrainian flag, which she tied on her shoulders. “I recreated the atmosphere of wartime kitchens in the 10th arrondissement of Paris. [To raise money for the war effort] We prepared 1,000 meals for the locals, but sold only 50 of them. I was really disappointed. French people don’t understand that Ukrainians are fighting to protect the rest of Europe,” she says.

On 19 May, Daria made a radical decision: she returned to Ukraine, even if this possibly meant losing her life. She needed to find her friends, her family and be among those “who know what war is”. On her way back, where I joined her, her emotions changed from laughter to tears. On the train between Poland and Ukraine, she could no longer hold back her emotions: “It’s over, I’m going home,” she said, before bursting into tears. Her smile widened as she moved closer to home.

Now the country is chaotic. In most cities, anti-bombing sirens still wail several times a day. In Kyiv, it is possible to have brunch on the terrace of a trendy restaurant down the street from military funerals. But the young producer knows that she’s not alone. More than 2.5 million Ukrainians have returned home since the beginning of the Russian invasion. Six months later, Daria has no regrets. She tells me that she will stay in Ukraine “until the victory”.

Poland expects 500,000 Ukrainians to arrive in the coming months, fleeing winter, increasing Russian terror and a lack of access to water, electricity and heating.

There are more than a million Ukrainian refugees in Poland. Aid agencies predict the new arrivals will be different, and traumatized by the war. Feeding them could be a challenge. There are currently 80,000 refugees sheltering in aid centers, and many living in overcrowded housing.

In the first weeks of the war, Polish society gave massive support to refugees. Solidarity may again be needed as migration experts believe the state’s preparations are inadequate.

“You are living in a fairy tale,” a neighbor in the small German village where I fled from Ukraine in the spring told me. But beautiful scenery is not enough to calm someone living under constant stress.

My current house has more items than my apartment in Kyiv. The whole village helped me, by collecting kitchen utensils, furniture, and clothes. People even found a coffee machine when they heard that I liked coffee. I had almost everything.

But my integration was like a slow walk. I woke up around 4 a.m., checked if everything was okay with my friends and relatives in Kyiv, and then fell asleep until 9 a.m. when I started working. I had permanent internet access and didn’t need to hide in a damp basement. But the inner numbness of my life changed so quickly. The dissonance between the photos from Ukraine and the landscape outside my window kept me awake.

Of course, this was the first stage ― a rejection of the new reality, combined with an uncertain future. Having overcome the fear of speaking German, I began to communicate with locals more. When I started to understand how these people live, it became easier to overcome stereotypes.

Germany isn’t just a country with a strong social security system, and a place where nothing should ever distract people from planning their weekend entertainment, as some stereotypes suggest. It’s a very diverse place with its problems and divisions, rules and traditions.

I have accepted the new rules of life and broken down many barriers: linguistic, emotional, bureaucratic. Openness, gratitude for people, and activity helped it all go smoothly. But…each of our stories is much more complicated than any “fairy tale” we see in the lives of others or that they see us in.

Russia’s strategic goals in the Western Balkans have long been clear. By taking advantage of corrupt local elites, the Kremlin exploits the existing ethnic divides to stoke anti-Western sentiment, further complicate the region’s already sluggish reform plans, and prevent more countries from joining the EU or NATO.

The track record includes its refusal to recognize Kosovo’s independence, a coup attempt in Montenegro and its support for separatist-minded leaders in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The recent Bulgarian blockade of North Macedonia’s EU aspirations also provides space for malign Russian influence. The same is true in Serbia, where Moscow has capitalized on continuing Serbian resentment of the 1999 NATO campaign.

However, it is not the Kremlin, but the EU that has been providing pretexts for this development for far too long.

Although the peacekeeping missions in Bosnia and Kosovo have played an important role in maintaining stability, European indecision has led to a rise in anti-Western sentiment and to doubts about the EU’s true intention to provide a way forward for the region.

Over the past two decades, Brussels has lost its focus on the region and started showing ambiguity towards its EU perspective. Unsurprisingly, this has alienated many citizens, for whom EU ideals increasingly seem like a pipe dream.

All the Kremlin had to do in the meantime was pour salt on the Balkans’ wound to make things worse.

“Russia’s strategy has been to manipulate the rifts in the Western Balkans. We would like to counter this […] And we would like to bring them closer to the EU,” a senior German diplomat told Euractiv at a meeting of countries from the region in Berlin last week.

It is time Brussels acted. Russia’s war is a wake-up call to revive the enlargement process and clarify the EU’s strategic vision. Otherwise, Europe risks losing the Balkan peoples’ mindshare and leaving its front yard vulnerable – which is dangerous for the EU itself.