Anti-EU politicians: 'Brussels has been beaten'
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Marine Le Pen changed her Twitter profile picture into a Union Jack flag (Photo: europarl.europa.eu)
By Peter Teffer
European far right politicians have congratulated the British voters for the decision to leave the EU, a result which will surely inspire the anti-EU movement for years to come.
“Liberty has won,” said French National Front leader Marine Le Pen on Friday (24 June), shortly after the British media called the results.
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Wilders: 'Brussels has been beaten' (Photo: EUobserver)
“Like I have demanded for years, there now has to be a similar referendum in France and in the countries of the EU,” MEP Le Pen wrote on Twitter. She changed her Twitter profile picture to the Union Jack flag.
Her colleague from the Netherlands, member of the Dutch parliament Geert Wilders, also repeated his call for a Dutch in-out referendum.
“Great Britain is leading the way to the future and liberation,” his party said in a statement.
“Brussels has been beaten,” Wilders told Dutch TV.
Italian MEP Matteo Salvini, leader of the right-wing anti-EU Lega Nord, wrote “now it is up to us”.
“Long live the courage of free citizens,” Salvini said on Twitter.
Flemish nationalist Gerolf Annemans called the British voters “heroes” and quoted English poet Percy Bysshe Shelley.
“Sow seed-but let no tyrant reap … Thank you for this liberation,” the Belgian MEP tweeted.
German member of the European Parliament Beatrix Von Storch, of the eurosceptic Alternative for Germany party, said on Friday the result means that the leaders of the European Commission and the European Parliament should resign.
“June 23 is a historic day. It is Independence Day for Great Britain. The people were asked - and have decided. The European Union has failed as a political union. Juncker and Schulz are to answer for this. They must resign,” she said.
The eurosceptic movement has had considerable success in recent years, with their representation in the European Parliament growing to 140 of 751 MEPs in the most recent elections of 2014.
