Brussels
European voters abstained in massive numbers from voting last week in elections for the European Parliament, the E.U.’s legislative body. Turnout was less than 45 percent, the lowest it has been in any Europewide vote since World War II. For some of the newest E.U. member states, such as Poland, turnout was less than 20 percent. Those who did show up tended to use their votes to express dissatisfaction with whatever party was in power in their own country. Earlier, pundits had predicted that parties that supported the Iraq war would be punished at the polls. But anti-war governing parties, such as those of French President Jacques Chirac and German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, did just as badly as the pro-war parties of Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and British Prime Minister Tony Blair. The outgoing European Parliament president, Pat Cox, called the results “a wake-up call” and urged European leaders to work harder to demonstrate the E.U.’s relevance to voters.
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