Is Malmströms chance Sweden's?

Sweden's European Union presidency is nearing its end this December and it appears that Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt has done his best to work on the priority issues during the last five months. The most important was to secure the cooperation of major countries like the United States, China and India in the forthcoming Summit Meeting on Climate Changes in Copenhagen. Although no iron-clad assurances were made by these countries during the prime minister's recent state visits, Reinfeldt has stated that he was hopeful the meeting will result in an agreement that meets the economic and environmental considerations of countries concerned.

The European Union has now entered a new phase whereby an EU president and a foreign minister have been chosen. The choice, when the names were announced created a ripple of surprises because they were unknown personalities in the EU galaxy of politicians. For months now, there were popular choices speculated for the presidency and the foreign minister posts. The final vote came as a total surprise.

Sweden will have a new EU commissioner, Cecilia Malmström, who is coming from the Liberal Party but who in her own right is an EU veteran. She will handle one of the toughest questions confronting the EU, that of asylum and migration as well as crime prevention. Dagens Nyheter stressed that tough policies are required today in the form of laws to curtail trafficking, organised crime and sexual exploitation of children as well as illegal immigration.

The asylum and migration issues continue to be a main thorn in the European Union's effort to accommodate refugees and asylum-seekers from countries in conflict. It is common knowledge that Sweden has taken more asylum-seekers than its economy can sustain, while other EU countries have turned a blind eye and a deaf ear to pleas for greater humanity and solidarity in the burden-sharing of refugee intakes.

Sweden is a small country with a big heart. It is a welcome development that the next Swedish commisioner after Margot Wallström is a woman, who will hopefully deal with all these tough issues with both heart and mind. Europe is far from being a united union with common purposes and interests. The national interests of many EU member-states remain strong even if the national borders have become more porous.#