Next European Union leaders face online security battle

It was always likely that EU leaders would struggle to agree on who might be the next European Commission president. “Electing a pope is easier,” said Taoiseach Leo Varadkar, after an end-of-month summit was fixed to try to identify a candidate. That haggling stands in contrast to the seemingly unstoppable march of Boris Johnson to Downing Street.

Mr Johnson and the incoming EU leadership are likely to get to know each other well, maybe too well, even if European leaders’ patience on Brexit is exhausted. It is hard to imagine that Mr Johnson will assuage that discontent, as the EU has many more-pressing issues.