The Council issued a statement after this week’s EU/China video conference. Council President Charles Michel stated, “I’m pleased that we could speak by video conference with President Xi, with Ursula von der Leyen and Chancellor Angela Merkel. Unfortunately, our physical meeting in Leipzig wasn’t possible. Europe needs to be a player, not a playing field….
Reaching a swift and ambitious agreement on the European recovery package is the EU’s highest priority for the coming weeks. The Commission has made proposals that respond forcefully to Europe’s recovery needs and will lay the foundations for a more sustainable and resilient economy for future generations. Since the Commission tabled its proposals for NextGenerationEU…
The European Parliament has recommended that the EU and its members states file a case before the International Court of Justice, if China applies the new national security law they have proposed for Hong Kong. In a resolution adopted on Friday (19 June) by 565 votes to 34, with 62 abstentions, the European Parliament voted…
Today is the 70th Anniversary of the signing of the Schuman Declaration, which was originally presented by French foreign minister Robert Schuman on 9 May 1950. The Declaration proposed the creation of a European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) between France, West Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg, to enable these countries to pool…
The true scale of the death toll due to the corona virus in Northern Italy may never be known but it has already far out-stripped the capacity of the regional authorities to be able to respond to the crisis. In the city of Bergamo, the local mayor Giorgio Gori has said that “many of the elderly…
A ‘phone call between the president of the European Council Charles Michel and president Vladimir Putin of the Russian Federation took place yesterday on Thursday January 16, 2020. This was the first contact between Charles Michel, in his capacity as President of the European Council, and Russian President Vladimir Putin. The timing was planned so…
The EU needs to “turn the promises of the past few months into results that improve people’s lives” That was the message on Sunday from parliament’s president David Sassoli who was speaking in Brussels. He joined the Presidents of the three EU institutions and the European Central Bank to mark the inauguration of the new Commission and…
