Delivering a speech on the inauguration of a university in Belgium, the EU foreign policy chief makes a statement exhibiting just how much "European exceptionalism" is still alive and well. 

As he addresses students at the College of Europe in Bruges on Thursday at a university program designed to raise the next generation of European diplomats, Borrell compared the European Union to a "garden" that must be protected from the "jungle" outside. 

The EU, according to Borrell, has the best combination of “political freedom, economic prosperity and social cohesion” ever known to humankind.

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“The rest of the world… is not exactly a garden. Most of the rest of the world is a jungle, and the jungle could invade the garden. The gardeners should take care of it, but they will not protect the garden by building walls,” Borrell said.

He insisted that Europeans have to be "much more engaged" with the rest of the world and put their "privilege" to positive use. 

European engagement in the outside world, particularly in Belgium, resulted in severing African hands and stealing infinite resources. 

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About 42 students are participating in the pilot program, with candidates coming in from various EU institutions. Georgian, Moldovan, Ukrainian and Turkish candidates are also participating. 

“You are the first generation. You are the trailblazers of a process, and I hope that many others will come,” Borrel told the students. “Keep the garden, be good gardeners. But your duty will not be to take care of the garden itself but [of] the jungle outside.” 

Last March, Borrell told El Mundo, a Spanish newspaper, that “if we don't want the jungle to eat our garden, we have to wake up.”

Europe moving towards a fascist sentiment 

The EU foreign policy chief is keen on adopting this garden-vs-jungle rhetoric, fueling a Eurocentric sentiment focused on gatekeeping the continent from the citizens of countries it either bombs or simply pillages, making refugees collateral damage of this imperial outlook. 

The Spanish government, in conjunction with the NATO Summit, is pushing to designate border crossings as a “hybrid threat” alongside terrorism as part of NATO’s new strategy concept – very fitting for a country with a ‘leftist’ president. 

Europe has been taking on an anti-refugee concept – rigid and violent. Last winter, Poland left refugees to freeze to death in the forests on its border. In 2019, Italy’s former Prime Minister, Matteo Salvini, called on the EU to suspend all naval rescue operations in the Mediterranean Sea, which left thousands of people to drown. “Progressive” Finland, with its application to join NATO, declared its intention to begin constructing barriers along its border with Russia to guard against any refugees being used as “hybrid warfare” by Russia.

This comes hand-in-hand with NATO’s latest strategy, which entails ramping up troop presence in the eastern flank of Europe from 40,000 to 300,000 troops, and employing expansion strategies to counter Russia and China. With that being said, NATO very much hopes to expand in Africa in terms of its military operations – and that in itself entails violence.