European Union

A video posted on Snapchat showing a high school student holding a pistol to his teacher's head has caused an outcry on Twitter. Under the hashtag PasDeVague (Don't Make Waves) teachers are posting their experiences with school violence. How serious is the problem and what are its causes?

Another Czech soldier was killed in Afghanistan on Monday, the fourteenth casualty the Czech army has suffered during this mission. Should the country withdraw its troops?

James Dyson, the billionaire British inventor of the bagless vacuum cleaner, has chosen to build his electric car in Singapore to be close to Asian customers, supply chains and a highly skilled workforce.

NATO’s largest exercise since the end of the Cold War will focus on the mock defence of Norway. "Trident Juncture" starts on Thursday (25 October) and involves 50,000 military personnel from 31 countries – the 29 NATO members plus Sweden and Finland.

A proposed ePrivacy regulation currently under discussion at EU level would hurt new business models in the clean energy sector, which are “almost all” based on the collection and treatment of data by home equipment and smart meters, warns an industry coalition.

There is a need to form progressive alliances to tackle critical issues such as immigration, social inequalities and inefficient economic policies in the run up to European elections 2019 stressed the Vice-President of the European Parliament and head of the SYRIZA delegation, Dimitris Papadimoulis, in an exclusive interview with EURACTIV Greece.

EDA and Thales Six GTS France SAS have signed a contract within the Agency’s EU Satcom Market project for the provision of secure network and communication services to the Military Planning and Conduct Capability (MPCC) and the EU’s Training Mission (EUTM) in Mali. The contract contains several options which, when triggered, will extend the services also to the EU Training Missions in the Central African Republic and Somalia. The contract has a potential value of €6 million and runs until the end of 2021. 

The specific contract was awarded following a reopening of competition between contractors previously awarded the Service Framework Contracts for the Provision of 'Communication and Information System (CIS) Services for Headquarters and Deployed Forces' in the context of the EU SatCom Market Project

Thales Six GTS France SAS will provide network and communication services for both unclassified and EU Classified Information (EUCI). Services provided include a secure WAN with LANs, work stations, printers, VoIP phones, VTC and encrypted mobile phones for EUCI communication, SMART phone communication application, Cyber Defence services, technical support, training, accreditation support and transportation. 

The contract signing is the result of a close cooperation between EDA, MPCC and the missions’ CIS personnel to define the requirements and evaluate the most advantageous proposal. EDA has been in the lead of the process up to the signing of the contract and will continue to be fully responsible for its management throughout the implementation. 

MPCC, which is responsible at the strategic level for the planning and conduct of non-executive military missions under the political control and strategic guidance of the Political and Security Committee, will be able to exercise its responsibilities in a secured environment. This new capacity will enhance the reactivity of MPCC by speeding up the flow of information not only between MPCC and missions, but evenly between missions. MPCC and CPCC already study the possibility to enlarge this capacity to other CSDP actors. 

The overall purpose of the EU SatCom Market project is to provide contributing Member States with an option to efficiently source cost effective commercial Satellite Communications (SatCom) as well as wider Communication and Information Systems (CIS) services. The Satcom services offered include end to end services with transmission links as well as SatCom terminals for all bands (including military). The CIS services offered cover the integration of telecommunications with radio and IT networks and include hardware as well as software. The range of services provided through the EU SatCom Market project enable users to access, store, transmit, receive and manipulate information required to meet a wide range of operational needs, both abroad and at home.
 

More information: 

• EU SatCom Market project page
• EU SatCom Market factsheet

In Strasbourg, President Donald Tusk addressed the plenary session of the European Parliament on the discussions held during the European Council meetings.

UK nationals may need to buy visas to enter the EU after Brexit, if that is what the European Commission proposes next month.

The European parliament votes on Wednesday on measures to reduce plastics pollution. The proposal includes a ban on some of the most widely used single-use plastic items such as plates, straws, and light plastic bags, which make up 70 percent of marine litter. Europeans generate 25m tonnes of plastic waste yearly, but less than 30 percent is collected for recycling.

US president Donald Trump said on Tuesday that he plans to meet Russian leader Vladimir Putin in the margins the 100th anniversary of the WWI armistice on 11 November in Paris. Trump has announced the United States will pull out of the 1987 Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty because he believes Russia has violated the agreement. Beijing's growing arsenal also played into the decision to withdraw, he told press.

The European Union is set to complete ratification of a free trade agreement with Japan on 20 December, Jyrki Katainen, the EU commissioner in charge of jobs, growth and investment, told a press conference in Tokyo on Tuesday. "EU and Japan are doing different from what the United States is doing," he added. The free trade zone will cover 600m people and a third of global GDP.

The construction of a super-modern school in Vukovar, a town that symbolises suffering in Croatia's 1991-95 independence war, was meant to foster inclusiveness and reconciliation in a place that remains divided along Croat-Serb ethnic lines. But the project never took off and Norway is now demanding its funding back. EURACTIV Croatia reports.