US accused of picking a fight with Europe as JD Vance unloads at Munich security conference

US Vice-President JD Vance has warned the loss of European values poses a greater threat to the continent than Russia does, in a blisteringly blunt address to the Munich Security Conference.

US Vice-President JD Vance has warned the loss of European values poses a greater threat to the continent than Russia does, in a blisteringly blunt address to the Munich Security Conference which immediately raised the ire of politicians.

European leaders sat in shock as Mr Vance touched on sensitive issues such as abortion laws in Britain, Europeans rejecting the recent election in Romania and leaders not countering illegal migration: accusing them of ignoring wishes of the public and constraining freedom of speech.

After his 20-minute speech, politicians at the conference hit back. Germany’s defence minister Boris Pistorius said Mr Vance’s remarks were “unacceptable”. He denied the suggestion that Germany and the EU were authoritarian and that they feared populist parties.

“This is not acceptable, this is not the democracy that I witness every day in our parliament, every opinion has a voice,” Mr Pistorius said.

Kaja Kallas, the EU’s foreign policy chief, said the speech was the US “trying to pick a fight” with Europe.

“Listening to that speech, they try to pick a fight with us and we don’t want to a pick a fight with our friends,” she said, insisting that there were bigger threats such as Russia’s war with Ukraine.

Ukrainian politician Oleksiy Honcharenko, who was in the room listening to the speech, tweeted that Mr Vance brought about the “total humiliation of all European leaders”.

“People in the room are shocked. For most of Vance’s speech, the European leaders and bureaucrats looked at each other, and there was almost no applause.”

Mr Vance had told the conference: “There is a new sheriff in town,” referring to President Donald Trump. “We may disagree with your views but we will fight to defend your right to offer it in the public square.”

He added: “If you’re running in fear of your own voters, there is nothing America can do for you, nor, for that matter, is there anything that you can do for the American people who elected me and elected President Trump.”

As many in the room looked on stony-faced, Mr Vance said European leaders looked like they were hiding more and more behind ugly Soviet era words like misinformation and disinformation.

“You simply don’t like the idea that somebody with an alternative viewpoint might express a different opinion or God forbid, vote a different way, or even worse when an election,’’ he said.

He even addressed the Munich security conference organisation which had banned politicians representing populist parties on both the left and the right.

He said: “Now, again, we don’t have to agree like with everything, or anything that people say, but when political leaders represent an important constituency, it is incumbent upon us to at least participate in dialogue with them.”

Mr Vance opened his speech saying the threat that worries him is not Russia, not China, nor any other external actor.

He said: “What I worry about is the threat from within. The retreat of Europe from some of its most fundamental values.”

“The biggest threat to Europe isn’t external — it’s internal. A retreat from its own fundamental values, values shared with the US.”

He said that a former European commissar went on television recently and sounded delighted that the Romanian government had just annulled an election and warned the very same thing could happen in Germany too.

“Now, these cavalier statements are shocking to American ears,’’ he said.

“When I look at Europe today, it’s sometimes not so clear what happened to some of the Cold War’s winners.’’

But he said he was most concerned about “dear friends, the United Kingdom” saying the country’s backslide away from conscience rights has placed the basic liberties of religious Britons, in particular, in the crosshairs.

He spoke about Adam Smith-Connor, who was arrested while praying when he refused to leave a safe zone around an abortion clinic.

Mr Vance said: “He was sentenced to pay thousands of pounds in legal costs to the prosecution. Now, I wish I could say that this was a fluke, a one-off crazy example of a badly written law being enacted against a single person, but no, this last October just a few months ago, the Scottish government began distributing letters to citizens whose houses lay within so-called safe access areas. Warning them that even private prayer within their own homes may amount to breaking the law.”

Mr Vance finished his speech urging European leaders to listen to the public.

“European leaders have a choice, and my strong belief is that we do not need to be afraid of the future embrace what your people tell you even when it’s surprising, even when you don’t agree. And if you do so you can face the future with certainty and with confidence, knowing that the nation stands behind each of you. And that, to me, is it is the great magic of democracy.”

Later in the day Mr Vance met with Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky calling for “durable peace”. He said: “We want the war to come to a close, we want the killing to stop, but we want to achieve a durable, lasting peace, not the kind of peace that’s going to have Eastern Europe in conflict just a couple years down the road”.

Mr Zelensky said there were more work to do to prepare a plan for how to stop Vladimir Putin.