BRUSSELS: Sighs of relief will be heard all over Europe as a shaken continent bids adieu, hopefully not au revoir, to Jean- Marie Le Pen. But of the many troubling questions that linger in his wake, one is particularly acute: what can the EU do to help combat far-right political parties and the racism and xenophobia they breed?

Romano Prodi, the commission president, believes the answer is to focus on crime, immigration and unemployment, and not abandon them to France’s National Front, the British National Party, the Belgian Vlaams Blok and their fellow travellers. “More Europe, not less,” he recommends.

Peter Hain, Britain’s foreign office minister, prescribes similar treatment: job-creating economic reform; rapid eastwards expansion (“reuniting Europe to fight the forces that seek to divide it”); bridging the gap between remote institutions and disenchanted citizens; fighting cross-border crime and co- operating on asylum.

But construction of Europe’s pompously named “space of freedom, security and justice” has been agonisingly slow. Between the two rounds of the race for the Elysee, the 15 member states finally agreed their first move towards a common asylum policy: harmonising reception standards to end “shopping” for the best conditions for the Kurds, Moroccans, Afghans and Chinese who seek to enter Fortress Europe.

EU governments playing pass the parcel with these wretched of the earth know that with their own aging populations, plummeting birth rates and half a million illegal immigrants, they must work together to manage migration. But the instinct to keep things strictly national dies hard. The mindset remains one of “burden- sharing” and reducing numbers, not meeting humanitarian obligations.

Immigration controls, for example, are exempt from the EU race equality directive, which thus cannot be used to fight the harassment and abuse common at airports and railway terminals. Spain, gateway for a quarter of all immigrants to the union, has an especially bad record. But it took the wave of attacks on Jewish targets to get governments to issue a declaration condemning racism and xenophobia.

Too little has been done.

Back in 1997, the Amsterdam treaty required member states to pass dedicated race relations legislation. Only Britain and the Netherlands — where the gay populist Pim Fortuyn is campaigning on a slick anti-Muslim, zero-immigration platform — have it. Germans and Austrians will be complaining more about Uberfremdung (too many foreigners) when Poles and Czechs join the club. Italians and Danes already talk about “swamping”.

Too few make the link between unemployment, self-esteem, institutional racism and the opportunities exploited by Le Pen and gang, argues the Euro-MP Claude Moraes. “Cold winds are blowing over our continent,” warns Sweden’s immigration minister, Jan Karlsson.

Equal rights should begin at home. Non-white faces are conspicuously absent from EU institutions. The commission’s 20,000 staff include so few that no figures are available. That compares badly with the civil service in Britain, where ethnic minority recruitment has reached 7 per cent. The 626-member European parliament counts 10 non-white MEPs. The EU diplomatic corps has two non-whites.

This is all a reminder of how much has changed since Europe’s grand project, set to music by Beethoven, was dreamed up by Catholic white men scarred by the fratricidal devastation of two wars. In 1957, when the European Economic Community was founded, Algeria was French, Turkish Gastarbeiter had not arrived in Germany and Britain’s imperial winds of change were just blowing up. Over the years, there has been a deliberate emphasis on the diversity of member states and regions, so the Irish, Portuguese and Greeks would feel their identities and heritage were safe. It hasn’t stopped the right raging at homogenising, nation-eroding euro-globalisatiotion. Or helped French Muslims feel European.

The EU was born from the ashes of a world where rampant nationalism and genocidal racism were allowed to flourish. It is right to worry about tackling the social and economic roots of extremism. So here’s a thought for Europe Day on Thursday. Grandiloquent statements may help build a more inclusive society. But let’s also see more black and Asian Europeans working in Brussels — and not just in office canteens. It could be a single market in tolerance and diversity.—Dawn/The Guardian News Service.