European Union

More than 20 shellfish trucks parked on roads near the British parliament and Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Downing Street residence on Monday (18 January) to protest against post-Brexit bureaucracy that has throttled exports to the European Union.

Belarus was on Monday (18 January) stripped of its role as co-host of the 2021 ice hockey world championship over "growing safety and security concerns related to both the rising political unrest and Covid-19".

A coronavirus mutation has been discovered among 35 newly infected patients in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Bavaria, Germany, Deutsche Welle reports. It is different to the new variant found recently in the UK, but doctors do not yet know if it is highly infectious. "We have to wait for the complete sequencing. We cannot say at all at the moment whether this [mutation] has any clinical relevance," a doctor at the hospital said.

On Tuesday, the Italian senate will vote on the government of prime minister Giuseppe Conte after former prime minister Matteo Renzi pulled out his ministers from the ruling coalition, Il Corriere della Sera writes. On Monday, the house of representatives already voted in favour of Conte's government, but the majority in favour is much smaller in the senate. Conte has said he did not plan to resign despite Renzi's move.

The UK has appointed judge Gary Hickinbottom to lead a special enquiry into increasing lawlessness in its Caribbean protectorate, the British Virgin Islands (BVI). The BVI has long been known as a tax and money-laundering haven, including in several EU bank scandals. But massive hauls of cocaine and reports of tens of millions of dollars in embezzled funds from government construction projects in recent years prompted Britain to take action.

Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte will on Tuesday (19 January) face a vote of confidence in parliament, seeking the Senate's support for his teetering government as it battles a deadly coronavirus pandemic.

It remains to be seen if Laschet will be the CDU's candidate for German chancellor, but some of his foreign policy views have raised eyebrows in the past.

Lawmakers in the European Parliament raised concerns about possible UK regression on pesticides and gene editing at a meeting on the new EU-UK trade agreement on Thursday (14 January).

Czech health minister Jan Blatný is aware of the negative impacts of coal mining on the environment and human health. “Personally, I am in favour of a coal mining phase-out as soon as possible,” he told EURACTIV.cz.

EU countries hinted new sanctions might come if Russia further harms opposition hero Alexei Navalny, but France and Germany want business as usual for now.

The International Ice-Hockey Federation (IIHF) said Monday it was dropping plans for Minsk and Riga to co-host its 2021 world cup, due to safety concerns arising from coronavirus and the "political unrest" in Belarus. The IIHF had met with Belarus officials last week, despite ongoing torture of pro-democracy protesters there, in the hope the sports event could have been "a tool for reconciliation," the IIHF noted in its decision.

The EU should protect its companies from other countries' sanctions, better enforce its asset-freezes, and encourage more euro-denominated trading, according to a European Commission paper due Wednesday, seen by Reuters. EU officials should also look into "possible technical issues" in helping traders of complex financial products, such as derivatives, move from London to Europe. The strategy comes after the US threatened sanctions against EU firms involved with Russia and Iran.

People who exercise their right to refuse the coronavirus vaccine should not be discriminated against, but might face curbs on international travel in future, EU commission vice-president Maroš Šefčovič said Monday after informal video-talks with European affairs ministers. "There will be different options how we handle travel ... the possibility of the electronic vaccination certificate could be added," Šefčovič said, after Greece first proposed the idea of a vaccine-passport scheme.

The Energy Community, an international body in Vienna comprising the EU and nine EU-aspirant states from south-east Europe, has extended sanctions on Bosnia for non-compliance with Europe's energy market laws, it said Monday. The move comes after the Bosnian federation failed to liberalise its energy market because its ethnically-based entities could not agree. The sanctions, which include being locked out of Energy Community votes, have been in place since 2015.

The European Commission unveiled its plans for the 'New European Bauhaus' initiative - an environmental, economic and cultural project whose aim is to design "future ways of living" in a sustainable manner.

The Greek government last week requested that the European Commission and EU border agency Frontex help return 1,450 failed asylum seekers to Turkey. Turkey has refused, citing the pandemic.

Romania has drawn the signal that the time has come to resume the EU-level dialogue on protracted conflicts and their crippling effects on the region's security and development perspectives, writes the country's foreign minister, Bogdan Aurescu.

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