Eurotopics.net

On 22 June 1941, the German Reich under Adolf Hitler invaded the Soviet Union. A non-aggression pact was in force between the two powers at the time, so the USSR was ill-prepared for the attack. By the end of the Second World War, 27 million Soviet citizens had lost their lives - the highest death toll of any nation. To this day, the commemoration of the invasion testifies to widely differing perspectives.

The death of Caroline Crouch, a British woman, is making headlines in Greece. The Greek husband confessed to killing her last week and is now being tried by a court in Athens. He had previously lied to investigators for almost two weeks, claiming his wife was killed by a foreign gang in an armed robbery. Commentators are incensed by the country's handling of femicides.

Sweden's Social Democratic Prime Minister Stefan Löfven has lost a vote of no confidence in which the conservatives, the Left Party and the hitherto isolated right-wing populist Sweden Democrats voted against him. The latter initiated the vote, taking advantage of a dispute over rent policy in which the Left Party, as a supporter of the Red-Green minority government, had insisted on more influence.

The EU Commission has issued its first bond to finance its 750-billion-euro Covid recovery fund. Demand was huge: the bonds attracted around 142 biollion euros in orders - more than seven times the amount that could be issued (20 billion). An important milestone, commentators find.

After a weeks-long search, the heavily armed Belgian soldier Jürgen Conings has been found dead in a forest in Hoge Kempen National Park. The suspected right-wing extremist disappeared on May 17 after voicing death threats against the virologist Marc Van Ranst. The authorities had feared Conings was planning an attack on state buildings or public figures. The press doesn't believe he was a lone wolf.