European Union

Half a year after the poison attack on the former Russian double agent Sergey Skripal and his daughter, Scotland Yard has named and posted photos of the two suspects. They are thought to be affiliated with the Russian military intelligence agency GRU, Prime Minister Theresa May told parliament on Wednesday evening. Does this mean the Skripal case is solved?

Denmark has been rocked by a scandal over welcome rituals at grammar schools. According to reports one of the rituals involves 15 and 16-year-old girls starting upper school being selected to be waitresses at a dinner for pupils of the graduating classes. They are made to follow a dress code that includes wearing red panties and are often subjected to sexual harassment. Danish media are appalled.

As the European Commission considers its long-term strategy to cut EU greenhouse gas emissions, Julia Christian says they must reject an unproven and dangerous technology in favour of protecting and restoring natural forests.

Precision farming is consistent with the less-bureaucracy pillar of next CAP and favours a better connection between consumers and producers, stakeholders and lawmakers advocated at the showcase of EU satellite-based systems for agricultural purposes.

An EU-mediated dialogue aimed at resolving the Kosovo-Serbia issue will resume in Brussels on Friday (7 September) but the latest speculation that the conflict might eventually be resolved by swapping territory has turned everything upside down. EURACTIV Serbia reports.

Sales of the world’s most commonly used weed killer glyphosate in Germany reached 3,800 tonnes in 2016 - the lowest level in 13 years, Spiegel Online reported, quoting governmental documents.

Alpenrind and Others
Freedom of movement for persons
A posted worker is covered by the social security system of his place of work if he replaces another posted worker, even if those workers were not posted by the same employer

Sara Mardini and her sister, who competed in the 2016 Summer Olympics, in 2015 saved 18 refugees by swimming their raft to a Greek island. Mardini, who has a hero status in Germany for her efforts, has since returned to Greece to help others. Police now accuse the 23-year old of people smuggling and is in jail. "She is in a state of disbelief," her lawyers told the Guardian.

Horst Seehofer's CSU party took a tough line on migration at its congress and distanced itself from Merkel on foreign policy.

Cyprus interior minister, Constantinos Petrides, on Wednesday said the country will put forward measures to ease the spike of asylum seekers in the hope of offloading them on other EU states. "If these numbers continue to increase, I admit that we will no longer be able to cope with it," he said. The island-nation of 1.1 million received some 4,000 asylum applications in the first eight months of 2018.

A German court on Wednesday ruled that the country's financial capital Frankfurt will have to ban old diesel cars as part of an effort to reduce air pollution. "The driving ban is necessary because all other measures considered by the state will not lead to a significant reduction of nitrogen oxides emissions in an appropriate time," said the judge. The ban kicks in February 2019.

The EU’s decisions to approve state support for emergency power plants in France, Germany, Poland, Italy and Greece will all have to be revisited in light of the ongoing reform of electricity market rules, the European Commission said on Tuesday (4 September), saying it won’t make an exception for Germany.