Foreign enthusiasts: Pies - Filat - Saakashvili - Tadic

Pedro Pires - Vlad Filat - Mikheil Saakashvili - Boris Tadic

Brussels officials like to describe the EU as "normative Europe" - as providing inspiration to neighbouring states. And the bloc does indeed have an active fan club outside its borders. There is Pires from the small archipelago of Cape Verde who is keen to found his own European Union; Filat the former leader of Moldova who successfully fought off Europe's last Communists; Saakashvili the third President of Georgia, famous for sparring with Putin; and Tadic the long-serving President of Serbia, always happy to pull a former war criminal out of the hat to keep the EU happy. Unfortunately, Brussels' influence is always a little shaky, meaning that these people either turn out to be rotters who were simply playing the EU, or are replaced by rotters who simply play the EU. 

With apologies to: founding fathers; pint-size Napoleons; Tweedledum and Tweedledee; Magicians