Eurotopics.net

Armenian disaster relief workers are helping out in the areas hit by the earthquake in Turkey. In addition, the Armenian foreign minister, Ararat Mirzoyan, visited his Turkish counterpart Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu just a few days after the border between the two states, which had been blocked for decades, was opened for an aid convoy. Commentators see a chance to overcome the hostilities between the two countries.

According to the latest polls, the right-wing populist party Chega is gaining ground in Portugal, with up to 13 percent of the population saying they would vote for André Ventura's party. The national press debates whether the main opposition party, the liberal-conservative PSD, should clearly distance itself from the far right by establishing a "cordon sanitaire".

Roughly a week after the earthquakes in Turkey and Syria, the recovery efforts continue. It is now extremely unlikely that more survivors will be found; more than 40,000 dead have been pulled from the rubble so far. While in Turkey the search for those who are to blame for the high number of victims has begun, many in Syria are still waiting for help. Commentators give a voice to the despair.

More than 250,000 people demonstrated in Madrid for improvements to the healthcare system on the weekend. Another mass demonstration had already taken place in November. The demonstrators accuse the conservative regional government led by Isabel Díaz Ayuso of failing to address staff and equipment shortages in the capital's public healthcare system - a problem the implications of which go far beyond Madrid, as a glance at Europe's press shows.