European Union

The EU will contribute €150,000 of emergency assistance to communities most affected by the recent earthquake on the Indonesian island of Lombok, the European Commission announced Wednesday. It said that the aid will help provide access to relief items and access to clean water and basic health care to 4,000 people. The EU is also providing maps of the struck region made by its Copernicus satellite mapping system.

Poland’s trade unions are mounting a defence of coal workers against the impacts of climate policies in a government-backed conference this week. EURACTIV's partner Climate Home News reports.

The question of who was to blame for the war between Georgia and Russia over South Ossetia is still controversial today. The region had long been seeking autonomy, and Moscow didn't like Georgia's attempts to form closer ties with the EU and Nato. Since the five days of fighting the conflict has been frozen. Both the West and Russia should have learned more from the war, journalists say.

US President Trump has once again made the headlines with attacks against the media. This time he called journalists "horrible, horrendous people" and said much of the press was an "enemy of the people". While some commentators say it's just a matter of time before Trump gets caught in the trap of his own lies, others warn that his excesses must not become the norm.

The UK's ex-foreign minister Boris Johnson has said in a column commenting on Denmark's burqa ban that women wearing full-body veils looked like "letter boxes" and "bank robbers". In the text for the daily The Telegraph he spoke out against the ban but described the clothing as "absolutely ridiculous". Are these the words of a free thinker or a racist provocation?

US President Donald Trump has warned companies against trading with Iran in spite of the US sanctions. "Anyone doing business with Iran will NOT be doing business with the United States", Trump posted on Twitter. Commentators see his comment as an attack on the sovereignty of the US's European allies, and believe that in the end it is the US that will suffer most as a result of its newfound isolationism.

After the devastating fires which claimed more than 90 lives the Greek government has announced plans to have buildings that were constructed without permits torn down. In the village of Mati the fences and walls of such buildings had blocked the escape routes of people fleeing the fires. To begin with, over 3,200 buildings in the resorts around Athens are to be knocked down. The Greek press takes a sceptical view of the plan.