The SMEunited report published last week outlines the socio-economic impact of the pandemic and of the containment measures on the labour market and on households. Particular focus is put on the negative consequences faced by self-employed. They have been disproportionately impacted by the crisis. National Recovery and Resilience Plans should provide targeted measures to allow…
The European Union has not done enough to harness the full potential of its space programmes, according to a special report published today by the European Court of Auditors (ECA). While the satellite-based programmes Galileo and Copernicus in particular provide valuable services and data, more efforts are needed to capitalise on the significant investment made…
Fossil fuel industry lobbyists are expected to retain a stranglehold on Europe’s energy future, with a formal role in EU decisions on energy infrastructure development and funding, a new report claims. The European Commission has proposed to keep an obscure body advocating for vested gas industry interests – the European Network of Transmission System Operators…
Eurocontrol has released a new study that sets out what actions need to be taken in order to make every air journey as close to a ‘perfect green flight’ as possible. The paper examines why it isn’t possible to fly a perfect green flight today, which measures have the greatest potential to improve the sustainability…
The International Foundation for Better Governance (IFBG) has published an extensive investigation by award winning journalists Philip Braund and Colin Stevens on the issue of granting asylum in the UK to fugitive bankers from the former Soviet Union, who are accused of fraud and other illegal activities in their homeland. The multi-page document for the…
The Communist Party (CCP) of China is quietly but steadily modernising its naval power for the political goal of expanding its influence in the far seas in Asia and Africa through penetrative power projection operations, according to a report compiled to help the American Defence establishment to better understand the balance of strategic competition between…
Customs controls are still insufficiently harmonised across Member States to properly safeguard the EU’s financial interests, according to a new report by the European Court of Auditors (ECA). Despite recent steps in the right direction, the EU rules are not designed well enough to ensure that Member States select imports for control in a uniform…
China has been revealed as the strongest military in the world, scoring 82/100 points in a new study from Military Direct. Russia are 2nd with 69 and UK is 9th with 43 – higher than Germany (39) but below France (58) USA scores highly for its budget of $723bn In a conflict China would win by…
NATO collects defence expenditure data from Allies on a regular basis and presents aggregates and subsets of this information. Each Ally’s Ministry of Defence reports current and estimated future defence expenditure according to an agreed definition of defence expenditure. The amounts represent payments by a national government actually made, or to be made, during the…
“European countries are failing to protect refugees and migrants trying to reach Europe via the Mediterranean. Backsliding in the protection of the lives and rights of refugees and migrants is worsening and causing thousands of avoidable deaths each year”, said Dunja Mijatović, the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, while releasing a report. The…
