European Union

You choose your MEPs every five years, but did you realise you also have an impact on the set up of the other EU institutions?

Source : © European Union, 2021 - EP

The EU has a positive impact that reaches far beyond Europe’s borders. Watch the video to find out how.

Source : © European Union, 2021 - EP

Germany's coronavirus vaccination drive has slowed and those people who have not taken up the opportunity to have shots will have to take COVID-19 tests to take a full part in public life, Chancellor Angela Merkel said.

Taliban insurgents tightened their grip on captured Afghan territory on Tuesday (10 August), now controlling 65% of the country, as US President Joe Biden urged the nation's leaders to fight for their homeland.

Latvia on Tuesday (10 August) declared a local state of emergency along its border with Belarus, as Lithuanian lawmakers approved the construction of a fence to stem an influx of illegal migrants.

Poland's prime minister dismissed the head of a junior coalition partner from government on Tuesday (10 August), creating uncertainty over the future of an administration that has set Warsaw on a collision course with the European Union.

Six EU countries have called on the European Commission not to halt the deportation of Afghan migrants despite an accelerating Taliban advance, officials said on Tuesday (10 August).

The European Union on Tuesday said there had been a "significant decrease" in migrants crossing the border from Belarus into Lithuania after Iraq halted flights to Minsk.

The European Commission will analyse Poland's decision to scrap a disciplinary system for judges which critics say is a tool to pressure judges, the European Commission said on Tuesday.

Power and gas exporter Norway should seek to reclaim authority over energy regulation from the European Union as a first step towards renegotiating its wider ties with the bloc, the leader of the eurosceptic opposition Centre Party told Reuters.

A record number of migrants have crossed the Polish border from Belarus since Friday, the Polish Border Guard said, Reuters reports. Authorities in Poland and Lithuania have accused Belarus president Alexander Lukashenko of using migrants to put pressure on the EU to reverse recent sanctions and to hit back at Poland for giving refuge to Krystsina Tsimanouskaya, a Belarusian athlete who refused to return home from the Tokyo Olympics.

A Rwandan refugee suspected of causing a major fire that ravaged the cathedral in the French city of Nantes last year on Monday murdered a Catholic priest in western France, officials said to AFP. Father Olivier Maire, 60, was killed in the town of Saint-Laurent-sur-Sevre at the Montfortains religious community where he lived and where the suspect had also been given shelter.

Belarus' president Alexander Lukashenko has denied claims that his security services were involved in the death of dissident Vitaly Shishov, who was found hanged in neighbouring Ukraine last week, the BBC reports. "Who was he for me and for Belarus? For us he was simply a nobody," Lukashenko told reporters. Vitaly Shishov was organising help for Belarusians who fled to Ukraine from Lukashenko's post-election crackdown.

Norway's centre-left opposition parties are expected to defeat the incumbent Conservative-led coalition government by a two-to-one margin in next month's election for parliament, a new opinion poll showed on Tuesday, Reuters writes. Widely praised last year for a swift coronavirus lockdown, giving Norway one of Europe's lowest Covid-19 mortality rates, prime minister Erna Solberg nevertheless faces a backlash over economic inequality and public sector reforms that have proven unpopular.

The Taliban seized a sixth Afghan provincial capital on Monday following a weekend blitz across the north that saw urban centres fall in quick succession and the government struggle to keep the militants at bay, France24 writes. Insurgents entered Aibak without a fight after community elders pleaded with officials to spare the city from more violence. A Taliban spokesman confirmed the city had been taken.

Big data and evidence-based decision-making provide immense opportunities to improve health and well-being and prepare for the next crisis, if this force is applied for the good.

Non-essential travel from the US to the EU can continue for now despite a surge in US infections and lack of reciprocity, according to the latest European recommendation.

The EU said that Around 1,000 firefighters, 9 planes, and 200 vehicles have been sent to Greece from other European countries to help with the wildfires.

The Czech government delayed appointing a new head of its BIS counterintelligence agency on Monday (9 August) in a move seen as allowing Prime Minister Andrej Babis to keep the country's president on his side going into an October election.

The United States said it was up to Afghan security forces to defend the country after Taliban militants captured a sixth provincial capital on Monday (9 August), along with border towns and trade routes.