Mainstream groups in talks on cordoning off the far right in the European Parliament

Centrist forces are in talks to block the two newly-formed far-right groupings from being appointed to high-profile positions in the European Parliament, a spokesperson for the European People's Party (EPP) confirmed on Friday.

It means Patriots of Europe - which harbours the likes of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán's Fidesz and Marine Le Pen's National Rally (RN) - as well as Europe of Sovereign Nations (ESN) - which includes radical right-wing parties such as Alternative for Germany (AfD) - will likely be excluded from power roles in the parliament over the next five-year mandate.

"We are (...) currently in discussions with the Socialists and Renew in order to implement the 'cordon sanitaire' to the MEPs proposed by the groups that are in the extreme right, and the friends of Putin," the EPP group's spokesperson Pedro López de Pablo said.

"These are elected posts of the Parliament - vice-presidents of the Parliament, presidents of committees - and we don't want these MEPs to represent the institution, that’s the main reason," he added.

June's European elections saw the three centrist groups - the EPP, the Socialists and Democrats and the Liberal Renew Europe - cling on to a combined majority of 400 of the 720 seats in the chamber, despite far-right forces making considerable gains in many EU countries.

The results triggered a re-shuffle of the parliament's far-right factions, with both Patriots for Europe and Europe of Sovereign Nations (ESN) formed in recent days in time for the inaugural sitting of the parliament in Strasbourg next week.

That sitting will see the parliament elect 14 vice-presidents and five Quaestors to sit on the influential bureau that has power to shape the institution's rules and budget.

Patriots of Europe - the third biggest group in the parliament that will be led by Jordan Bardella from France's RN - is claiming two of the 14 vice-presidents. They are traditionally allocated taking into account the size of the groups, but Bardella's camp will lose out on representation in the bureau if the three centrist groups reach an agreement on the cordon sanitaire.

The EPP spokesperson also suggested that the two far-right groups would be blocked from claiming the chairmanship of the parliament's Committees, which allow MEPs to shape EU policies in key areas including the environment, healthcare, industry and technology.

"Regarding this undemocratic cordon sanitaire, I want to remind that we represent millions of European citizens that have the right to be heard. This is not a cordon sanitaire against (...) our group, it's a cordon sanitaire against millions of European citizens," Patriot spokesperson Alonso de Mendoza, who hails from Spain's Vox party, said.

The move comes days after Orbán, considered the driving force behind Patriots, sparked outrage in the bloc after visiting Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow as part of a so-called peace mission.

Orbán, a black sheep in the European Council, branded his communications during the visit with the logo of the Hungarian presidency of the Council of the EU, prompting further ire in Brussels.

Amid fears new EU lawmakers sympathetic to Russia will undermine the hemicycle's firm backing of Kyiv, the European Parliament will hold a vote to reinstate its commitment to supporting Ukraine militarily and financially as it continues to withstand Russia's illegal invasion.

Centrists torn on ECR

While the three groups agree on the exclusion of both Patriots and ESN from the bureau and committee leadership, they are less united in their position towards the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR), the hard-right grouping of Italian premier Giorgia Meloni.

Ursula von der Leyen, the EPP's lead candidate for the Commission presidency, has repeatedly expressed willingness to collaborate with parts of the ECR that she considers to be pro-European and pro-Ukraine, such as Meloni's Brothers of Italy and Czech premier Petr Fiala's Civic Democratic Party.

But her overtures have prompted outcry from her traditional allies on the left and in the centre.

Von der Leyen has since rowed back and committed to upholding the pro-European coalition that has collaborated in the European Parliament for the past decades. But she could still rely on some support from the ECR camp when her candidacy for the Commission presidency goes up for a crunch vote in Strasbourg next Tuesday.

It means the ECR, which with 78 seats is the fourth biggest force in the new hemicycle, has found itself straddling the centre-right and more extreme forces on the fringes.

On Friday, the ECR censured the centrists' imminent move to block the far-right.

"If a cordon sanitaire were drawn around some far-right groups, it could discriminate some 30 million voters," Michael Strauss, the ECR spokesperson said.

"The parliament is about representatives of nation-states and societies with all their differences," Strauss added. "We think that its task is to include the voices of all elected representatives in parliamentary activities, not to exclude those that displease a given majority."

In response, a spokesperson for the Greens/EFA group - which is currently weighing up whether to support von der Leyen in her re-appointment vote next week - said: "The far right are not democrats, so talking about democracy is a little bit rich. They should be approached differently."