History
In 1989 the Rainbow Group split. The Greens went off to form The Green Group in the European Parliament, whilst the Regionalists stayed in the rump of Rainbow Group. The 1994 elections saw a considerable reduction in Regionalist representation in the Parliament, with only the Canary Isles autonomists, Lega Nord, the Scottish National Party and People's Union keeping their MEPs. But Lega Nord had been suspended from the European Free Alliance following its decision to join the coalition Italian government alongside the right-wing National Alliance. Given this reduction in numbers, the weakened EFA were no longer able to maintain their own group.
The French Energie Radicale were considered centrist enough to be possible members of the ELDR Group (their successors, the Radical Party of the Left, became observers in the ELDR Party in 2006) but instead they allied themselves with the members of the Pannella-Reformers List and the rump EFA to form the Group of the European Radical Alliance.
The ERA stayed in existence until 1999, when a loss of support forced the European Free Alliance members of the ERA to rejoin with the Green Group to create the European Greens–European Free Alliance (Greens/EFA) group.
Read more about this topic: European Radical Alliance
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