The heads of State and Government of the European Union begin this Monday the negotiation to renew the senior positions of the European Union after the elections to the European Parliament, with four positions for which they must find a gender, geographic and political color balance.

Although there is always room for surprises, four names are in every pool: the German Ursula von der Leyen, again at the head of the European Commission; the Portuguese António Costa, for the European Council; the Maltese Roberta Metsola to repeat in the European Parliament and the Estonian Kaja Kallas as high representative of the EU for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy.

The leaders of the 27 sit down tonight at the European Council table to an informal dinner that is planned as a first approximation to this shortlist. Although it could lead to an agreement in principle, the EU heads of state and government still have a meeting at their formal summit at the end of this month to finalize their decisions.

Before dinner, the heads of State and Government of the European Popular Party will meet in a hotel in Brussels to agree on their strategy, focused on achieving the re-election of Von der Leyen as head of the Community Executive and on ensuring that their formation maintains the first half of the presidency of the European Parliament, which Roberta Metsola would hold again until January 2027.

To start the negotiations, each political family appoints two negotiators: the Greek Kyriakos Mitsotakis and the Polish Donald Tusk for the European People’s Party; the Spanish Pedro Sánchez and the German Olaf Scholz for the Party of European Socialists; and the Belgian Alexander de Croo and the Estonian Kaja Kallas for the Alliance of European Liberals and Democrats.

The European social democratssecond force in last Sunday’s elections, aspire on this occasion to the second most prized place in the cast: the presidency of the European Council for which the unwritten rule is that the person elected must have been or be head of State or Government of an EU country.

The main name on the table is that of former Portuguese Prime Minister António Costa, who has a very good relationship with Von der Leyen, Sánchez and Macron despite being hampered by his legal situation; The Portuguese Prosecutor’s Office is investigating him for alleged irregularities in lithium, green hydrogen and a data center businesses, but at the moment it has not presented evidence against him, has not charged him or given further explanations.

The head of European diplomacy, now in the hands of the Spanish Josep Borrell, would in principle go to a liberal candidate and the name of the Estonian Kaja Kallas, one of the strongest voices in the EU in favor of continuing support for Ukraine and sanction Russia. In her favor is that she is the only one on the shortlist from an Eastern country, although her very harsh line against the Kremlin may work against her.

Outside of the three large pro-European political families, the Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloniwinner of the European elections in her country, expressed her hope that in the formation of the new leadership of the European Union the role of Italy and the desire of the voters, mostly leaning towards the right, is understood.