European Union

It is French students rather its secondary school pupils who are giving impetus to the mobilisation of young people to combat climate change, a movement which is slowly starting in France. EURACTIV France reports.

Committee meetings, Brussels

Source : © European Union, 2019 - EP

A special UN summit scheduled in New York next September will provide “an essential opportunity to mobilise political will to raise global ambition” on climate change, according to a draft EU statement due to be adopted on Monday (18 February).

Europe's biggest aerospace company Airbus announced on Thursday that it will end deliveries of the A380 in 2021. It explained the move saying that in recent years orders for the world's largest passenger aircraft had continually dropped and its production was no longer profitable. Many commentators are saddened, seeing the end of this prestige project as the end of the era of giant aircraft.

EU negotiators have reached an agreement on the text of the controversial EU copyright reform including intellectual property rights. In future search engines are to pay money to publishers for showing excerpts of articles and platforms must take action to prevent copyright infringements. Publishers are happy while consumer advocates fear the new rules could fuel online censorship. What will be the impact of the reform?

Poland and the US have invited representatives from 60 countries to Warsaw to discuss the situation in the Middle East at a two-day conference. The event is controversial because critics are calling it an anti-Iran conference. But the fact that representatives from Tehran aren't attending isn't the only disappointing aspect as far as commentators are concerned.

Germany's Social Democrats want to overcome their plunge in the polls with new concepts for the social welfare state and a reform of the Hartz IV unemployment benefit system introduced under former chancellor Gerhard Schröder. Some commentators see the measures as a key move to raise the party's profile. Others say they don't go far enough.