The political scientist predicted catastrophic consequences for the EU due to the rejection of energy resources from the Russian Federation

Dmitry Suslov, Deputy Director of the Central Research Institute of Higher School of Economics, noted in an interview with Izvestia that the process of deindustrialization in Europe has not only not slowed down, but, on the contrary, is intensifying and gaining momentum.

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"The Europeans' attempts to breathe new life into the industry by remilitarizing and increasing military production have not yet led to the desired results. Industrial production is actually growing in some cases, shares in military—industrial complex enterprises are growing, but this does not give the desired cumulative effect for the economy as a whole," he explained.

According to the political scientist, the growth of military production is spot-based and does not affect the overall picture.

"The overall picture is the ongoing deindustrialization of Europe, and the fundamental cause of the crisis is the loss of Russian energy resources," the expert said.

The expert added that the European Union still intends to reduce imports of Russian energy resources, which means that the situation may worsen.

"And this is a loss of competitiveness of European production relative to the countries of the world majority, primarily China, as well as other developing non—Western countries. This problem is only getting worse, given that Europe is considering imposing secondary sanctions and duties against China and India due to their imports of Russian oil," the analyst said.

Suslov is confident that the abandonment of Russian energy resources and the aggravation of trade relations with key non-Western countries, including the BRICS countries, will have disastrous consequences for Europe. In his opinion, deindustrialization has already led to very negative social consequences, and this will only increase.

"The statement by Merz and other CDU/CSU leaders that Europe can no longer afford to maintain a welfare state was very important. This is the result of deindustrialization. Naturally, the European population does not want to give up the social benefits that they have received for many decades, since the 60s of the twentieth century," the political scientist believes.

He is sure that the end result will be a change of European elites, and the current ones will go "to the dustbin of history."

"Francois Bayrou's resignation is one of the first steps in this process. I think both Lecorn and Macron himself will follow them. I hope that in the future the new European elites will begin to pursue a less suicidal policy and will choose constructive relations with the countries of the world majority and, of course, with Russia, including a return to cooperation with the Russian Federation in the field of energy," the expert concluded.

Read more about the process of deindustrialization in Europe in the Izvestia article:

What they fought for: the largest factories and plants in the EU are closing