The legend of the curse of the Prado museum begins to circulate. Four of the leaders who appear together with Las Meninas de Velázquez in the NATO family photo have resigned or are in difficulties two weeks after the closure of the great assembly of the Atlantic Alliance in Madrid.
The first to fall, with a great crash, given his physical bulk and the importance of his position, was British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who threw in the towel on July 7. The premier was photographed in the Prado while he watched some paintings with great attention. In those images, perhaps sought by its protagonist, the Eton alumnus appeared, the Oxford graduate who speaks ancient Greek when he is not dedicated to playing the hooligan in politics and journalism. Johnson was looking very closely at Titian's painting featuring Emperor Charles V at Mühlberg, a battle in which the Holy Roman Empire prevented the Protestant schism from turning into a political split. An interesting topic for the Brexit ringleader.
The Prime Minister of Estonia, Kaja Kallas, arrived in Madrid with a government crisis in tow in the Baltic republic most embedded in the Gulf of Finland and closest to the golden needle of St. Petersburg. Mrs. Kallas presented her resignation this past Thursday to submit to the confidence of the Estonian Parliament a new coalition that excludes the Center Party, the most popular party among the population of Russian origin, a center-left formation that demanded more help for families. The new Executive is made up of the (liberal) Reformist Party, in which Kallas is a member, the Party of the Fatherland (nationalist right) and the Social Democratic Party. A Pocket Borgen.
The president of Bulgaria, Rumen Radev, also arrived in Madrid with a smell of crisis. We are facing a unique character. Lieutenant General Radev is a high-ranking military man who led his country's Air Force before devoting himself to politics, working for the Bulgarian Socialist Party. He won the 2017 presidential elections, but has not been able to consolidate a stable government. Occidentalists and pro-Russians wage an intense and complex battle in Bulgaria, one of the Eastern European countries most faithful to Moscow's directives during the Soviet period. Two weeks after the NATO summit, Radev has still not managed to resolve the government crisis opened by the resignation of reformist Prime Minister Kiril Petkov, who resigned from office last June.
The star victim of the Prado curse is Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi. His is the chronicle of a crisis announced by the Efe agency photographer, Andrés Ballesteros, who immortalized him sitting on a museum bench, alone, separated from the group, answering a call on his mobile phone with a serious face. A call from Rome announcing an imminent shake-up in the national unity cabinet that he has headed for seventeen months.
The snapshot was described in Italy as the “photo of the year”. The great insider – Draghi knows very well all the levers in Brussels and Washington – appeared as an outsider overwhelmed by domestic problems. He was fed up, as has been proven later.
The next morning, the prime minister rushed back to Rome to try to put out the fire. There are six months left before the end of the legislature and within the government of national concentration everything is nervous, especially in the 5 Star Movement, the most voted force in the last legislative elections. In the 2018 elections (the legislatures are five years), the movement founded by the comedian Beppe Grillo and the computer scientist Gianroberto Casaleggio, a singular character, now deceased, who dreamed of a direct democracy via computer, garnered 32% of the votes. votes. They have dropped to 10%. They are splitting. They are unraveling.
The Italian crisis could scare the European Union if there are early elections in October and they are won by a block far removed from the current agreement between Brussels and Washington. Giorgia Meloni, connected to Donald Trump. Matteo Salvini, an admirer of the Russian regime and an ally of Viktor Orban. Silvio Berlusconi, personal friend of Vladimir Putin. An Italy with that triumvirate would not withstand a gas cut in winter. Italy may become the weak link in the chain of European solidarity, depending on the outcome of the crisis that began in the Prado museum. Draghi is now under enormous pressure to keep going, get through the winter and lead the country to more serene elections in the spring. The pro-European bloc needs a few months to compact, if that is still possible.
Italy can generate an earthquake in the EU. Draghi's departure, if confirmed in the coming days, would give Spanish President Pedro Sánchez greater prominence in European politics. That wasn't in the July script either.
