European Union

Vienna’s energy and infrastructure utilities say the Commission’s long-term strategy unveiled this week is in line with own their forecasts and goals.

European Union negotiators are locked in talks about new rules meant to cut carbon emissions from light vehicles but the complexity of the proposed regulation threatens to bog down the negotiations.

Afghanistan's President Ashraf Ghani on Wednesday (28 November) announced in Geneva a 12-person team for prospective peace talks with the Taliban, as his government pledged unwavering commitment to resolve the conflict despite persistent bloodshed.

It is increasingly unlikely that the global rise in temperature will be limited to 1.5°C. The current trajectory, if maintained, would lead to the planet warming by 3.2°C in 2100, according to a new UN report. EURACTIV France reports.

The Hungarian government has hired a van to drive around Brussels with billboards showing Guy Verhoftstadt, a leading Belgian liberal MEP, next to images of recent terrorist attacks in the EU, and with the slogan saying it was "insane" to claim, as Verhoftstadt had done, that there was no migration crisis. "He and cabal of European liberals push a pro-migration agenda," Zoltan Kovacs, a Hungarian government spokesman, said.

Results from Georgia’s presidential runoff showed the ruling party-backed candidate, who favours balancing the ex-Soviet republic’s relations with Moscow and the West, defeating her rival who advocates a stronger pro-Western line.

A no-deal Brexit would jeopardise security cooperation with the European Union, Britain's security minister Ben Wallace will say on Thursday (29 November).

The new Common Agriculture Policy budget is moving towards a science-based approach, with most targets multidisciplinary in nature and requiring member states to come up with specific national approaches,  a senior EU official told EURACTIV.com.

The European Commission’s new proposal on the post-2020 Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) gives more flexibility to member states when it comes to implementation and pushes for a tailor-made approach adjusted to the EU countries’ diverse farming needs and circumstances.

EU ambassadors today endorsed a deal with the European Parliament on new rules aimed at ensuring a smooth transition for the type-approval of motor vehicles, as well as of systems, components and separate technical units intended for these vehicles, when the UK leaves the EU.

The European Union issued a declaration on the EU on the escalating tensions in the Azov Sea

Tracing people who fail to pay road fees will become easier even when their vehicles are registered in another EU country.

Presidency reaches provisional political agreement with the European Parliament on the systematic inclusion of safeguard measures in bilateral trade agreements

The Council adopted its position on a recast regulation which bans the world's most harmful chemical substances.

Main agenda items, approximate timing, public sessions and press opportunities.

The far-left GUE/NGL group in the European Parliament has joined the chorus of demands for an internal probe on MEPs involved in Morocco lobbying, following an investigation by EUobserver. This website exposed how Morocco lobbies parliament for its claim on the Western Sahara. The GUE/NGL are demanding the parliament's lead rapporteur on Morocco file, French liberal Patricia Lalonde, be replaced. Lalonde is on the board of a pro-Morocco foundation.

Germany has said France should give up its permanent seat and veto on the UN Security Council and turn it into an EU seat instead. "I realize this will take some convincing in Paris, but it would be a bold and smart goal," German finance minister Olaf Scholz said in Berlin Wednesday, AFP reports. The French UN ambassador, Gerard Araud, said it would be "legally impossible" under UN charter rules.

France and Germany are not interested in imposing extra sanctions on Russia for its recent attack on the Ukrainian navy, Kurt Volker, the US envoy to Ukraine, said in Berlin Wednesday. "We certainly encourage our European allies to look harder at what additional sanctions could be implemented," he said, adding: "That is not something Germany and France have said they're considering, but these things, I think, can develop over time".

The European Commission is not touching controversial issues like whether Europeans should eat less meat or fly less often.

France is the most heavily taxed EU state, with the French treasury taking back 48.4% of the GDP in one form of levy or another, according to a European Commission study. Belgium came second on 47.3% and Denmark third on 46.8%. The EU average was 40.2%, with taxes on the up across the board since 2010. Ireland had the lowest rating, on 23.5%, followed by Romania (25.8%) and Bulgaria (29.5%).