When the European Union finalises legislation adopted by its executive body, the European Commission, the definitive texts of the directives are thrashed out in secret, closed-door meetings known as “trialogues”, unknown to the general public, where no minutes are kept. The trialogues – sometimes called trilogues – bring together, and without democratic control, representatives from the EU’s three major institutions: the Commission, the European Council of Ministers and the European Parliament. Mediapart's Brussels correspondent Ludovic Lamant reports.
Nathalie Griesbeck, a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) who represents the French centre-right UDI-MoDem party alliance, travels to meetings of “the trialogue” as if she were heading off to war. “I go there with all the legitimacy of the mandate given to me by the European Parliament,” she said. “That mandate is my solid base. I don’t let go. It is my amour as a parliamentarian, to engage battle in face of the council and the commission.”
