European Union

On behalf of the European Council, I wish to congratulate you on becoming Prime Minister of the Republic of Croatia. 

Your nomination comes at a crucial time both for Croatia and the European Union. Today, more than ever, we need unity and solidarity in Europe, in order to deal with the refugee crisis effectively. Bearing in mind the region's role as a key transit route for large numbers of migrants, Croatia will continue to be an important and valued partner in this effort. 

Europe also needs to show determination in carrying out economic reforms necessary to create jobs and growth. I trust that under your leadership Croatia will contribute constructively in rising to these as well as other challenges facing Europe today. 

I look forward to working closely with you and welcoming you at the European Council of 18 and 19 February.

AMENDMENTS 1 - 15 - Draft opinion on discharge in respect of the implementation of the general budget of the European Union for the financial year 2014, Section III - Commission and executive agencies
Committee on Foreign Affairs

Source : © European Union, 2016 - EP

AMENDMENTS 1 - 18 - Draft opinion on discharge in respect of the implementation of the general budget of the European Union for the financial year 2014, Section X - European External Action Service
Committee on Foreign Affairs

Source : © European Union, 2016 - EP

It is my pleasure to extend my wholehearted congratulations to you on your election as President of the Portuguese Republic. On behalf of the European Council and personally, I wish you every success in your work. I trust that under your term, Portugal will benefit from the political stability and social cohesion that are necessary to respond to the challenges lying ahead.

In 2016 Portugal  celebrates 30 years of accession to the European Communities. I am pleased to note that the political commitment and popular support of your Nation to the European project and values have always remained among the strongest. I have the firm conviction that Portugal will continue to contribute to the development of the European Union, the completion of monetary union and appropriate responses to geopolitical threats. 

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Spain's King Felipe VI, left, receives Mariano Rajoy on Friday amidst coalition talks

At the height of the eurozone crisis, it almost seemed on Brussels summit days that the EU gathering itself was not the most important meeting in town. Many focused instead on the pre-summit gathering of Europe’s centre-right political family, known as the European People’s party (EPP).

For a time, that assembly included not only the leaders of the Franco-German power axis (Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy), but also of the eurozone’s two other large economies (Spain’s Mariano Rajoy and Italy’s Silvio Berlusconi, and then Mario Monti). Almost every country under siege was there, too, including Portugal (Pedro Passos Coelho), Ireland (Enda Kenny), Cyprus (Nicos Anastasiades) and of course Greece (Antonis Samaras). For good measure, two of the most important non-eurozone countries were also represented (Poland’s Donald Tusk and Sweden’s Fredrik Reinfeldt).

But after another weekend of fast-moving developments in Spain, when Mr Rajoy essentially gave up on his efforts to retain the premiership, that lineup could easily be reduced to Ms Merkel and a handful of leaders viewed either as quasi-pariahs (Hungary’s Viktor Orban) or far from the EU’s main power centres (Mr Anastasiades, Mr Kenny and Bulgaria’s Boyko Borisov).

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The Informal Justice and Home Affairs Council takes place on 25 and 26 January 2016 in Amsterdam. Ministers meet to discuss European cooperation on security, migration and justice.

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Mr Moscovici, right, chats with Mr Juncker. He will present the new tax measures next week.

Next week, the European Commission will take its latest step in its ongoing quest to move beyond the LuxLeaks corporate tax avoidance scandal that has periodically dogged President Jean-Claude Juncker.

Pierre Moscovici, the EU’s tax policy chief, is set to unveil a flurry of proposals aimed at tackling so-called base erosion and profit shifting: in other words the aggressive tactics used by multinationals to shrink their tax bills by as much as possible. This morning, we’ve done a story about the new proposals, which we obtained. But we’ve also now posted them here for others to read.

The so-called LuxLeaks revelations emerged shortly after Mr Juncker became commission president in November 2014, and dogged his early days in office. They documented how during his two decades as Luxembourg prime minister, up to 340 multinational companies, ranging from Ikea to Pepsi, funnelled profits through the tiny country to lower their tax bills to as little as 1 per cent.

The commission has embarked on a wave of regulatory changes to close loopholes, including making a renewed push for the longstanding EU goal of having a common consolidated corporate tax base for companies. It is also pursuing high profile competition cases against tax deals Luxembourg and others struck with multinationals such as Apple, Amazon and Fiat.

Most recently, the European Commission ordered Belgium to recoup about €700m from 35 multinational companies that have benefited from the country’s generous fiscal incentive scheme.

Mr Moscovici’s plans, which are outlined in a 13-page summary posted here, enshrine international agreements reached by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development into EU law, and in some cases go even further – notably when it comes to restricting the ability of companies to shift of profits from parent companies to lightly taxed subsidiaries.

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Amid the doom and gloom surrounding the eurozone’s continued inability to shake off the funk that set in after the sovereign debt crisis started six years ago, policymakers have recently been able to latch on to a bit of sunshine that Brussels has dubbed “temporary tailwinds”. These “tailwinds” are not the kind of good news normally associated with a strong economic recovery, such as companies expanding or workers’ wages increasing. Instead, they’re called “tailwinds” because they make it easier for those things to start happening – a little wind at the back of those thinking about investing in a new plant or hiring more people.

For the eurozone, these tailwinds take three forms: lower oil prices, which fatten the wallets of consumers and energy-intensive industries; a weak euro, which makes European products cheaper to sell overseas; and “accommodative” monetary policy, which lowers interest rates and makes it cheaper for investors to borrow money and build things.

There’s nothing much EU policymakers can do to affect the price of oil, though lifting Iranian sanctions has contributed to the perception the world is now awash with supplies. But yesterday Mario Draghi, the European Central Bank president, did a whole lot for the other two “tailwinds” with just a few sentences of central-bank-ese. First, he described “heightened uncertainty about emerging market economies’ growth prospects, volatility in financial and commodity markets, and geopolitical risks” – by which he mostly meant recent market upheaval in China. He also noted that eurozone inflation, which is supposed to be running at about 2 per cent each year, remained “weaker than expected”. Then he unleashed the sentence that got everyone really excited: “It will therefore be necessary to review and possibly reconsider our monetary policy stance at our next meeting in early March.” Which means that his already-accommodative monetary policy is likely to get even more accommodative in just a few weeks.

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