European Union

The Spanish left declared victory over the far-right in elections on Sunday, as their adversaries vowed to "reconquer" the country.

The UK's opposition Labour party's leadership will decide on Tuesday whether the party's manifesto for the European elections in May should commit to holding a second Brexit referendum. The party is split on the issue and under pressure from polls. An Opinium survey found support for the Brexit party lead by Nigel Farage neck-and-neck with Labour on 28 percent each, and support for the conservatives down to 14 percent.

German chancellor Angela Merkel and French president Emmanuel Macron are co-hosting a West Balkan summit in Berlin on Monday to revive dialogue between Serbia and Kosovo on possible border changes. The initiative comes after a Brussels-led dialogue collapsed last year. Leaders of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Montenegro, Serbia, Slovenia and EU representatives will participate, while North Macedonia's Zoran Zaev and Albania's Edi Ramawill meet separately with Merkel.

Austrian far-right leader Heinz-Christian Strache has asked voters to support his Freedom Party (FPÖ) in European Parliament elections and help counter migration flows that he called an unwanted "population exchange".

A draft treaty on future EU-Swiss relations is not acceptable to Swiss trade unions. "This text is dead," said Pierre-Yves Maillard, president of the Swiss Trade Union Confederation (SGB) in an interview to NZZ am Sonntag. Switzerland has the highest wages in Europe and could not allow uncontrolled opening of the Swiss labour market due to risk of wage pressure. "Ultimately there is no way around fresh negotiations," he added.

While several UK parties have already launched their campaigns ahead of European Parliament elections on 23 May, the Conservative party is holding back and focussing instead on next week's local elections, party chair Brandon Lewis has told the BBC. Talks between UK prime minister Theresa May and Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn are set to continue this week to try to break the deadlock over Britain's exit from the European Union.

The British and Irish governments have agreed to start a new round of talks on 7 May to restore the power-sharing government in Northern Ireland, which collapsed in January 2017. Northern Ireland has not had a government since then. The new process comes after Irish and British premiers attended the funeral of Lyra McKee, a journalist killed during rioting in the Creggan area of Derry on 18 April.

The Capitals brings you the latest news from across Europe, through on-the-ground reporting by EURACTIV’s media network. In this edition: Socialists win in Spain, Merkel and Macron receive Western Balkans leaders, migration row continues in Belgium, and much more.

The new head of Switzerland's powerful labour union federation rejected a draft treaty with the European Union and called for restarting negotiations with the country's most important trading partner.

Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker offered interesting comments on present-day leaders of member states from Central Europe, on the occasion of the 15th anniversary of the 1 May 2004 accession of 10 countries, known as “the big bang”. 

China sought to put a gentler face on its massive plan to recreate the old Silk Road at a summit that ended on Saturday (27 April), saying it must do more to explain the programme and boost sustainability even as state media hit back at critics.

European leaders will try to bring bitter foes Serbia and Kosovo back to the negotiating table at a regional summit in Berlin on Monday (29 April), hoping to reboot a dialogue over one of the Balkans' thorniest disputes.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez looks set to regain power after his Socialists overcame a historic challenge by right-wing nationalists in elections on Sunday (28 April), a result he portrayed as a morale booster for the European Union. The Socialists...

85% of EU citizens believe vaccines are an effective way of preventing diseases, but almost half of them think vaccines "can often produce severe side-effects," according to a new Eurobarometer survey.

iPhones and Android products don't use the same charger. This is annoying for consumers and harmful for the environment. Old chargers produce more than 51,000 tons of electronic waste per year.

Under the future Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), the European Commission will not approve the national strategic plan of a member state that does not include the promotion of the bioeconomy in agriculture, the EU's farming Commissioner Phil Hogan said on Thursday (25 April).

Theresa May is likely to make one last attempt to pass her Brexit Withdrawal Agreement in a bid to avoid having to hold European elections next month, but not before UK local elections on Thursday (2 May).

Spain's socialist-led government can help re-start Europe by pushing its alternative to economic austerity and prioritising the fight against climate change, writes Udo Bullmann.