THE MOOD IN CANNES:All along the seafront, the posters on the bus stops were reading everyone's mind: "CONTAGION." It happens to be the title of this week's big cinema release in France, but the French presidency might as well have placed the ads to focus minds in the Palais des Congres.
Outside and in, the mood was sombre – surreal even. Cannes couldn’t have made itself look more bleak. On the Croisette, rain lashed the deserted paths and made the yachts bob like toys in the water. The town itself was closed down, with thousands of police officers guarding every access point and admitting only residents, officials and journalists.
Protesters were kept far away in Nice, leaving only the odd solo demonstrator such as the Buddhist monk who made his anger known – if you listened closely – by politely tapping a little drum in front of a dozen nonplussed riot police.
All week the politicians struggled to impose themselves on events that seemed out of their control. France’s elaborate choreography, in preparation for over a year, went out the window. Meetings overran, press briefings were cancelled. The euro’s troubles overshadowed everything, with crowds gathering around TV screens for the latest from Athens and new rumours surfacing all the time. Taboos fell like confetti: the single currency area could lose a member, Greece could return to the drachma. At one point, a news agency ran a story headlined “Europe shares rally on Greek govt collapse talk”, and, by today’s upended logic, it somehow made sense.
Nicolas Sarkozy had to cancel a bilateral with Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh because a hastily convened euro zone meeting overran. Two hundred journalists waited for a scheduled briefing from EU officials who simply didn’t turn up. The story turned every hour. “I guess you guys have got to be creative here,” Barack Obama told Angela Merkel. “It just keeps on going.” After weeks and months of crisis management, the Europeans looked exhausted as yet another round of late nights beckoned. Out went the niceties of diplomatic protocol. When George Papandreou arrived for his dressing-down on Wednesday night, neither Sarkozy nor anyone else showed up to greet him.
Emerging from that meeting in the early hours, a furious Sarkozy – his summit well and truly hijacked – gripped the lectern tightly as he and Angela Merkel slowly, deliberately laid down the law for the Greek prime minister. It was an electric moment, improvised and raw. “We will not let the euro be destroyed, nor will we let Europe be destroyed or torn apart,” he said. Merkel nodded gravely. “This referendum has changed the psychological situation massively,” she said again and again.
Even the lighter moments – and there weren’t many – felt strained. Standing beside the French president, Obama said he was glad to hear that newborn Giulia Sarkozy had inherited her mother’s looks, not her father’s. When the translation dropped, Sarkozy allowed himself just the briefest rictus smile.
The summit ended as it began, with all eyes on Athens – this time for the outcome of the confidence motion in Papandreou’s government. Sarkozy declared himself delighted at the G20’s “remarkable” achievements.
Not everyone was as impressed, but if they achieved nothing else, world leaders surely know more than they ever did about the intricacies of the EU, or “the most beautiful idea ever imagined for keeping the peace,” as the French president put it.
“Merkel and Sarkozy joked that I’ve had a crash course in European politics these past several days,” Obama remarked yesterday, having sat in on a euro zone session late the previous night. “There are a lot of institutions here in Europe, a lot of meetings.” But he sounded satisfied, concluding that the summit had “moved the ball forward”.
In an adjoining room, Christine Lagarde was throwing her own sporting metaphor when she was asked about the “goalposts” for the IMF’s monitoring of Italy.
“I do synchronised swimming, dear. I don’t play football.” It was a flourish worthy of Cannes, home to the greatest European drama of all.
