VIENNA, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- The European Forum Alpbach (EFA) opened its "political symposium" in the western Austrian village of Alpbach on Saturday with European cohesion, climate change, and extremism among the issues touched on by speakers, Austria Press Agency reported.
The motto for the forum this year is "Diversity and Resilience". Austrian President Alexander Van der Bellen said the latter is something the EU must display if it wishes to stay relevant alongside the U.S., China and Russia.
He said numerous issues are presently being faced, such as migration, a dwindling cohesion on the European continent, and rising nationalism.
Europe is also presently susceptible to disruption from outside forces, he said, arguing that for several parties, a re-division of Europe would be seen to be beneficial.
These countries could strengthen themselves while seeing Europe lose relevance. Here cooperation and cohesion is needed in the EU, instead of a reversion to "dwarf states".
Climate change is another important issue, the Austrian president saying current generations are probably the last who will still be able to implement effective measures against global warming.
Former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon agreed with this sentiment, noting during his address that there is "no plan B, because there is no planet B".
Keynote speaker Julia Ebner, an extremism expert, addressed the issue of how terrorists and extremists operate both online and offline to achieve their goals, such as through organizing terror campaigns, election meddling, spreading disinformation, hacking, and online "trolling".
EFA President and center-right politician Franz Fischler called for Central European values such as solidarity, rule of law, sustainability, and democracy to be elevated, and denounced fake news, increasing populism, and world politics played out in social media, as threats to a liberal democracy.
The political symposium at the EFA is to run until Tuesday.
