On Thursday, a mass of enraged farmers demonstrated outside the EU Parliament building in Brussels to protest environmental restrictions and the threat to their livelihoods posed by cheap Ukrainian imports. Behind police lines, demonstrators threw stones, eggs, and abused the bureaucrats.
Tractor convoys began flowing into Brussels on Wednesday night, and by Thursday morning, the Belgian capital’s roadways were blocked by approximately 1,300 vehicles, according to police estimates.
Farmers gathered in front of the European Parliament building in Luxembourg Square to burn pallets and stacks of manure. The crowd hurled eggs, stones, pyrotechnics, and flaming missiles at the assembly, while similar disturbances unfolded outside the adjoining European Council buildings.
Riot police used water cannons to extinguish the fires and push back stone-throwing protesters. As of Thursday afternoon, no arrests or injuries had been reported.
The rally marked the climax of months of rallies in various EU countries. Farmers in Germany have been blocking city streets since December, asking that Chancellor Olaf Scholz abandon plans to eliminate a fuel subsidy, while those in France have also protested rising energy costs. Farmers in Eastern Europe have protested an EU policy that allows tariff-free imports of low-cost Ukrainian grain, greatly undercutting local output.
Across the bloc, decisions made in Brussels are a common source of grievance. Farmers have condemned the EU’s planned Mercosur trade deal, which would allow the tariff-free importation of produce from Latin America, thereby forcing EU farmers to sell at a lower price. The farmers have also demanded that the EU roll back regulations, including a requirement that they leave 4% of their land fallow and reduce livestock numbers to lower nitrogen emissions.
A short walk from the protest, the European Council met on Thursday morning, but agricultural issues were not on the agenda. Instead, the council agreed on a €50 billion package of economic aid to Ukraine. However, Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo told reporters that the farmers’ concerns would be discussed, stating that EU leaders “need to make sure that [the farmers] can get the right price for the high-quality products that they provide.”
