Pedro Sánchez has escaped for a few hours from the storm over the Koldo case in Spain to be received like a star at the congress of European socialists, held this Saturday in Rome. “The very soul of Europe is at risk,” he warned from the Italian capital, where the first swords of the social democrats have gathered to kick off the campaign for the June community elections and proclaim their candidate for office. President of the European Commission, the Luxembourger Nicolas Schmit.
In a speech in which he avoided any reference to Spanish internal politics – nor did he talk about the recent report on the amnesty law of the Venice Convention -, the President of the Government has warned of the dangers that an increase in forces of the far-right parties in the European elections and has assured that the Social Democrats, who start second in the polls, will have to be in charge of “defeating that threat and ensuring that history continues to move in the right direction.”
Presented as a “symbol of democracy”, applauded in front of the La Nuvola congress center – they have even congratulated him on his birthday, on February 29 –, Sánchez has taken pride in some of the social measures approved during this European legislature marked by pandemic and the war in Ukraine.
“It was the welfare state and solidarity between peoples that allowed us to overcome those terrible challenges and move forward,” he indicated, saying that this shows that social democratic ideas have saved Europe despite the fact that many previously considered them extinct. And, in his opinion, all this progress is now in danger due to the advance of far-right parties in the European Parliament. “Worker rights, equality between men and women, public services, freedom and respect for the LGTBQ community or a more just and sustainable transition,” he noted. “The very soul of Europe is at risk.”
Sánchez spoke in Rome, where the social democrats are experiencing very difficult times since the arrival to power, a year and a half ago, of the leader of the Brothers of Italy, Giorgia Meloni. Sitting very close to Elly Schlein, the young hope of the Italian Democratic Party (PD) to be able to beat Meloni’s pull, the Spanish president has heard how the name of Giacomo Matteotti, the socialite murdered by the fascists in 1924, was evoked. “The ghosts of the past are again at the doors of our institutions: hatred, greed, falsehoods, climate denialism, authoritarianism. “They are equipped with new digital tools and have powerful allies inside and outside Europe.” “But we are going to defeat them as we defeated them in the past, and we will continue to build a new, better Europe,” he concluded.
