'Significant win' for Brussels as France, Slovenia back pro-EU leaders
Brussels breathed a sigh of relief on Sunday evening as voters in France and Slovenia shunned nationalists to back pro-EU leaders.
Congratulatory messages from across the 27 country bloc abounded for Macron, who beat far-right leader Marine Le Pen in the second round with 58.54% of the vote to 41.46%.
Brussels chief Ursula von der Leyen declared herself eager to continue to "move France and Europe forward" together with the French leader, while Olaf Scholz, Chancellor of Germany — whose country's close cooperation with France is often described as the EU's "motor" — said French voters had "sent a strong commitment to Europe".
EU Council President Charles Michel offered Macron a "bravo" on Twitter, adding that "in these troubled times, we need a strong Europe and a France fully committed to a more sovereign and strategic European Union", while Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi said his re-election is "great news for all of Europe".
The 44-year-old French leader is an unabashed EU enthusiast and celebrated his first-ever electoral victory in 2017 to the tune of Ode to Joy, the EU's official anthem.
But his pursuit of further integration and unity in several domains including in defence and industrial sovereignty as well as geopolitical positions on Russia and towards enlargement had at times ruffled feathers across European capitals. But the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine have quietened some of his detractors.
In his short victory speech on Sunday, the re-elected president mentioned Europe only twice to thank voters who "placed their trust in me to bring about our project for a more independent France and a stronger Europe".
He added that they had "chosen a humanist project, ambitious for the independence of our
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