The remarks cut against the EU\u2019s broadly hard-line stance toward Moscow since its full-scale invasion of Ukraine began and threaten to fuel a sensitive debate in the bloc about sanctions and Russian energy.<\/p>\n
De Wever\u2019s comments also come after a nationwide poll last week revealed he enjoys widespread support, with the Flemish-nationalist leader\u2019s popularity not only at a record high<\/a> in Dutch-speaking Flanders, but also growing in French-speaking Wallonia<\/a>. The strong polling may help explain the prime minister\u2019s willingness to push a politically sensitive argument.<\/p>\n \u201cThe conflict must be ended in Europe\u2019s interest. Without being naive about Putin. That\u2019s a mistake we must never make again. We must rearm and remilitarize the border. And at the same time, we must normalize relations with Russia and regain access to cheap energy,\u201d De Wever said in L\u2019Echo, adding it was a matter of \u201ccommon sense.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBehind closed doors, European leaders tell me I\u2019m right, but no one dares to say it out loud,\u201d De Wever was also quoted as saying.<\/p>\n You don\u2019t speak for us<\/p>\n De Wever\u2019s comments struck a nerve within his ruling coalition, which \u2014 apart from the prime minister\u2019s Flemish-nationalist N-VA \u2014 includes the Flemish socialist Vooruit party, the French-speaking liberal Reformist Movement, and centrist parties from both sides of the language border, Les Engag\u00e9s and CD&V.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThe prime minister can say whatever he wants in his own name, but he cannot speak on behalf of the government and claim that we now suddenly want to beg Putin for cheap energy,\u201d Conner Rousseau, president of Vooruit, told the VTM channel<\/a> on Monday.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The remarks cut against the EU\u2019s broadly hard-line stance toward Moscow since its full-scale invasion of Ukraine began…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6497,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4],"tags":[76,1586,7,1542,390,88,943],"class_list":["post-6496","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-belgium","tag-bart-de-wever","tag-belgian-politics","tag-belgium","tag-energy-security","tag-russia","tag-ukraine","tag-war-in-ukraine"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@be\/116240945195854237","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6496","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6496"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6496\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6497"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6496"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6496"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6496"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}