Wicelandic Post

For people from outside Iceland it is probably hard to understand the world Bjarni Benediktsson seems to live in.

The chairman of the Independence Party who is normally afraid of speaking his mind under the watchful gaze of his predecessors says in an interview with Frettabladid today that he is pro-European. He claims that it is ridiculous to maintain that the EU is somehow an enemy to Iceland. He thinks that the possibility of a good outcome of negotiations with the EU is false hope at best.

But, he thinks it is “incomprehensible stubbornness on the behalf of the EU not to open the possibility for the EEA countries to enter the common currency, to adopt the Euro.” He thinks the EU’s stance on this matter is the equivalent to an attack on the EEA agreement. The same can be said about its attitude towards IceSave. He thinks this means that the EU states would nothing rather than destroy the EEA agreement, that they don’t want exceptions or differences. “It is just politics.”

Well, duh! After a decade in which one of the smallest states in Europe wreaked havoc in its financial sector, by utilizing the “exceptions” and “differences” granted to it by the EEA agreement, and allowed to do so by the Independence Party, why would Europe want to grant Iceland a safe haven without further participation? With great power comes great responsibility and all that. With save currency havens come responsibilities as well.

According to my information, Bjarni Benediktsson and other members of the Independence Party and other parties in Althingi should take a long hard look at themselves before accusing European nations of a malicious attitude towards Iceland in the IceSave dispute. From the Netherlands we hear surprised voices who wonder why Iceland has not sent delegations, ministers or MP’s to speak on the country’s behalf to politicians, savers and the public. If it had been handled by a real European country then the discussions might have been much more successful and agreeable.

Instead Althingi sought the foxholes it knew too well. A partisan argument which lasted for months, when the best solution would have been a bi-partisan agreement to go forth and speak united on the country’s behalf against the much more powerful nations which had been wronged by Icelandic banks and Icelandic bankers. Don’t forget that due to Landsbankinn’s reckless management of IceSave and the government’s inaction a large number of ordinary citizens, charities and communities in the Netherlands and the UK have lost huge amounts of money.

What the EU member states for all their faults do much better than Icelandic politicians is that they talk, discuss and find a common ground to agree on. Icelandic foreign policy mirrors its internal politics, where statements fly between trenches and parties looks for their own maximum gain instead of a common agreement. But as Bjarni would maybe say, “it’s just politics”.

Not that you’d expect much from the chairman who scolded the Nordic countries a month ago for not coming to a “family members” aid in a time of need. Completely unaware that the Nordic countries believe themselves to be a part of a larger, more agreeable family called the EU. Regarding the EEA agreement, it seems ridiculous to think that the EU should want to spend its efforts on maintaining it were it not for Norway’s oil. Iceland has so far just tagged along. If Norway’s oil were to disappear, they’d be in the EU faster than an Independence Party member could say “bloody foreigners”.

Bjarni Benediktsson is an icon of the Icelandic drunks who stumbled into freezing pond in the middle of winter and don’t understand why others are hesitant coming to their aid unless they promise to make amends.

The rest of us would like to try something different from the whine being served from his backyard.