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With the speakers;
Charles Moore, former Editor of The Daily Telegraph and John O’Sullivan, CBE,
political commentator and journalist
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The President
of the Czech Republic, Václav Klaus, spoke to the Bruges Group on
'European Integration Without Illusions'. President Klaus is Europe’s
leading statesman
opposing European centralisation. He argues that, ‘The manifestations of
transnational progressivism—global governance and the European
Union—are supplanting liberal democracy and nation-states and driving us into
the stage
of post-democracy'
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The European Union
and the international bureaucratic class is a deadweight around the UK
suffocating inventiveness, economic growth and snuffing out prosperity. The
author and academic Professor Kenneth Minogue spoke at this meeting on
Excessive Governance and the Suffocation of Britain
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Historian and broadcaster Andrew Roberts spoke alongside Dr Irwin
Stelzer who is a respected economic and political commentator
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John O'Sullivan
founder and Co-Chairman of the New Atlantic Initiative and Executive Editor of
Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty discused Europe, America and Democracy
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In this paper it is
explained how successive British governments have surrendered our democracy to
layers of international bureaucracy which have acquired completely
unaccountable power over our legal, political, economic and social decisions.
At the heart of the matter, Professor Minogue argues, is the curious form of
idealism that disdains pride in Britain and British culture, preferring to
give allegiance to a far more vaguely defined ideology of internationalism.
This rejection of national sovereignty, and the subsequent embracing of
unaccountable transnational institutions, as advocated by our political
establishment, has led to the British people submitting to more and more
authority which comes dressed as virtue
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Should British
foreign policy reflect any political and moral principles or
should it merely be shaped by current conceptions of national self-interest,
which may change from decade to decade? Does Britain have any particular long
term or
permanent interests as a nation state or are we living in an age so radically
different from previous ones that none of the assumptions and traditions of
the past have
any relevance today? Has Britain's foreign policy traditionally had a
special pattern to it that makes it unlike the foreign policy of other
countries?
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The lessons of the
last sixty years are that the UK should re-think its fraught entanglement with
the EU. Britain cannot simultaneously pursue pro-American and pro-EU policies:
the two are mutually-exclusive
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Luke Johnson, the Chairman of Channel 4, and Dr Irwin Stelzer of The Times
and the Hudson Institute spoke to the Bruges Group on Wednesday, 24th May
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Britain and the USA
should promote the common values – of limited government, free trade, free
markets and individual liberty. However, the EU is going in completely the
opposite direction to this – which is damaging for Europe and damaging for the
Transatlantic Alliance
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Sally McNamara, EU
Project Director of the American Legislative Exchange Council, comments on the
implications of the EU Constitution for the United States of America
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What is the meaning
of the “constitution” of something resembling a new Soviet Union in Europe
that was presented to EU bosses at the end of June? How do its antecedents
shape predictions about how it will operate? Why is Tony Blair so keen on
promoting it? What will be its impact on Britain and on the “new Europe” drawn
from the debris of the original Soviet Union and its satellites? And how will
it affect the operation of international capital markets and of the world
economic system?
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The EU's Common
Agricultural Policy and French-inspired aggressive trade practices, such as
the dumping of sugar on the world market is according to Michael Moore
"literally killing people in the third world. In fact it is killing more
people than all of Dubya's bombs"
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Václav Klaus, the
President of the Czech Republic, speaking to the Bruges Group. Let us move to
Europe of economic freedom, to Europe of small and non-expanding government,
to Europe without state paternalism, to Europe without pseudomoralizing
political correctness, to Europe without intellectual snobbism and elitism, to
Europe without supranational, all-continental ambitions
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The EU has ambitions to harness the key military technology of our age -
the ability to use satellite-positioning technology, which has revolutionised
military operations, making possible the development of high-accuracy
all-weather weapons targeting and enhanced command and control systems. This
will give the EU a greater role on the world stage but at what price to the
Trans-Atlantic Alliance? Furthermore, the EU’s courting of business partners,
in particular the People’s Republic of China could also threaten world
peace
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We take no pleasure at all in welcoming the countries that more than ten
years ago courageously defeated Communism into another, though not so
oppressive, supranational, centralised, over-regulated, over-bureaucratised
state
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Dr Helen Szamuely looks at the emerging links between the EU and China and
exposes the fact that France is turning a blind eye to Chinese human rights
abuses
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In the first of the Bruges Group's A New World Order: What Role for
Britain? papers Professor Minogue argues that national interest are being
undermined by two factors: the "Olympian" attitude of legal
activists and international bureaucrats, backed by academics who wish to
create a new international order that would not be accountable or responsible
to anyone except those who run it and by the supposedly supranational but
really ersatz-national European Union. As a result of this dual development
Britain and Britishness may fade away
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An assessment of the latest development in the EU's Great Game. In
conjunction with some unsavoury business partners with appalling human rights
records, most notably China, the European Union is pushing ahead with the
Galileo satellite navigation system. Allowing other states to have control of
this technology will be a major blow to America’s pre-eminence and will boost
the military capabilities of potential enemies of the United States and its
allies.
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The EU's world view and international ambitions will create a world
where big brother knows best. Their supranationalism dictates that cordial
deals should be struck with tyrants. It dictates that international relations
should not be a matter governed by the democratically elected governments of
nation-states. Instead international affairs, and subsequently every other
matter, should be handed to supranational institutions and regional blocks
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The mysterious disappearance of the EU's ethical foreign policy
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Britain is approaching decision time. Will Britain follow a free and global
future or become an EU Province? This International Conference focused on the
EU Constitution and the UK's Role in Europe and the World
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What is happening between Europe and America? Dr Helen Szamuely looks at
developments in the Western Alliance
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Speech by John R. Bolton, Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and
International Security United States Department of State, to the Bruges Group,
London, 30th October, 2003
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Extracts from a Speech by Lord Lamont, former Chancellor of the Exchequer,
speaking to Citizens Against EMU in The Skandia Hall, Parliament Building,
Stockholm on Monday 1st September 2003
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Roger Helmer discusses the European Union's and the German
Embassy's undue influence in Estonia's EU accession debate
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The Common Foreign and Security Policy will split up the Western alliance
that had fought Communism and should now be fighting the new threat:
terrorism
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Dr Helen Szamuely takes a look at the international developments following
on from Tony Blair's visit to Eastern Europe
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The signing of the treaty in Athens, paving the way for the enlargement of
the European Union in 2004, was not the great occasion that it was hyped up to
be
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Roger Helmer, MEP speaks on enlargement, the future of Europe, plus Iraq
and the Common Foreign and Defence Policy.
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Help counter the EU propaganda aimed at undermining Estonia's liberal
economy and sovereign constitutional independence
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Peaceniks, the EU and Saddam - analysis of the international developments
relating to the War on Terror
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The War on Terror has opened a fundamental division between the
Franco-German axis and the other Europe
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The left-wing anti-Americans in the European Parliament are wrong to
despise the United States
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As the EU fails to act effectively against the Mugabe regime and tackle the
illegal French ban on British beef the emerging European superstate shows its
impotence
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A new organisation "Medborgere mot EMU" ("Citizens against
EMU") has been founded to present the centre-right case against Sweden
joining the euro
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The Bruges Group's campaign against EU propaganda finds support on the
Continent EMBARGOED UNTIL MIDNIGHT 19th June 2002
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54% of Germans want the Deutschmark back and now dub the new currency the
“teuro” from the German word “teuer” for expensive.
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The Director of the Bruges Group speaks to the Warsaw Business Journal and
offers his advice to our Eurosceptic comrades in Poland.
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The result of the Hungarian elections show that the EU's concerns were
unfounded and that their interference in the democratic process of a
nation-state was unwarranted.
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In 2003 sweden will have a referendum on joining the euro, but as Margit
Gennser points-out, euro membership will create major economic problems.
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The UK, the USA and the freeworld's political and economic interests
are being undermined by the EU.
Speech given to a meeting of the Bruges Group on Wednesday, 17th April, 2002.
Discussing, 'The Economics of European Integration'.
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The EU has missed an historic opportunity to help those countries that have
only just become liberated from the Soviet sphere of influence.
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The failed attempts of the left-leaning European Union to interfere in
Hungary's democratic process proves its bias agains centre-right parties
and demonstrates that it has little respect for democracy when the people make
the 'wrong' choice.
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Baroness Thatcher has dramatically moved forward the boundaries of the
European debate
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Britain must make a choice: Europe or America / more government or less.
Extracts of an address to the Bruges Group on Wednesday, 13th March 2002.
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Alternatives
to the EU
Dr Anthony Coughlan
Professor Christie Davies
Margit Gennser
Roger Helmer MEP
Dr Brian Hindley
Dr John Hulsman
HE the Rt Hon. Don McKinnon
Professor Ivar Raig
Dr Helen Szamuely
This International Conference, always a major newsworthy event in the
EU-sceptic calendar, was intended to further push forward the boundaries of
debate regarding the European Union. It did not disappoint. The Conference not
only criticised the push towards further integration but most importantly it
promoted the positive alternatives, for Britain and the nation-states of
Europe, to membership of the European Union. To this end the Bruges Group
gathered together in London many influential and internationally renowned
figures to discuss the positive, dynamic alternatives to the status quo, which
are on offer. The conclusions of this event left everyone convinced that a
free trade alternative model for Europe and the North Atlantic should be
vigorously pursued.
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: 17th September 2001
Terrorist attack on US | Election of Conservative Leader
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Dirty tricks from BiE and Irish PM's attacks on the Bruges Group's
support for the ‘no’ campaign fail, as Irish reject the Nice Treaty.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: 9th June 2001
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Release date: 29th September 2000
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