Európai Unió : hírek magyarul

After World War II, countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) started from low levels of socioeconomic development. Especially health indicators were worse than in most other world regions. This changed drastically when MENA countries became independent and started to invest into the social protection of citizens against health risks. They built up powerful social health insurance schemes, and today, many of their health indicators are almost on the same level as in Europe or North America. During the 1980s and 1990, however, most MENA governments reduced healthcare spending again as an element of structural adjustment programs, and focused increasingly on health services that are particularly important for the urban upper and middle classes, their main allies in society, but not so much for the poor. Therefore, MENA health systems suffer again from significant deficits regarding fairness, efficiency, and effectiveness. Financial, legal, and geographical obstacles restrict access for large parts of the population. The coexistence of multiple social protection schemes for different population groups reflects and intensifies already existing social inequalities. Deficits in quality and tidiness and the prevalence of informal fees charged for “good” treatment reduce further the value of public health services. Efficiency suffers from irrational prioritizations in fund allocation and from a lack of customer orientation. And the effects of MENA health systems, although not really bad, could still be better, which has become more than obvious during the recent COVID-19 pandemic.

On Monday, Parliament and Council negotiators agreed provisionally on changes to EU policy on the return of non-EU nationals staying illegally in the EU.
Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs

Source : © European Union, 2026 - EP

Bonn, 1. Juni 2026. Das Inkrafttreten des UN-Hochseeschutzabkommens im Januar stärkt die multilaterale Zusammenarbeit im Bereich der Ozeane. Gleichzeitig gefährden geopolitische Entwicklungen die Ziele der UN-Ozeandekade.

Am UN-Welttag der Ozeane steht der Ozean im Zentrum eines Paradoxons. Das Inkrafttreten des Hochseeabkommens (oder BBNJ-Abkommen) am 17. Januar markierte nach zwei Jahrzehnten der Verhandlungen einen seltenen Erfolg multilateraler Zusammenarbeit: Es verleiht dem Schutz der biologischen Vielfalt und dem gerechten Vorteilsausgleich jenseits nationaler Hoheitsgewalt neues politisches Gewicht. Zugleich dominieren weiterhin archaische Narrative zur Rohstoffgewinnung, militärischen Sicherheit und territorialen Kontrolle die Betrachtung der Ozeane.

Auf den ersten Blick haben Kalaallit Nunaat/Grönland und die Straße von Hormus wenig gemeinsam. Das eine wird als arktische „Grenze“ mit schmelzendem Eis, mineralischen Ressourcen, indigener Souveränität und Großmachtrivalität imaginiert. Das andere gilt als maritimes „Nadelöhr“ – als schmaler Korridor, in dem Energievorräte, Ernährungssicherheit, Schifffahrt und militärische Bedrohungen aufeinandertreffen. Beide Betrachtungen reduzieren diese Räume auf die Kontrolle kritischer Ressourcen und strategische Zugänge.

Dies als geopolitisches Phänomen zu betrachten, greift zu kurz: Der Meeresraum wird als Infrastruktur und politisches Druckmittel neu geordnet. In Kalaallit Nunaat überlagert der Diskurs über die ökonomischen Chancen der Arktis die Auseinandersetzung mit den Selbstbestimmungsrechten der indigenen Bevölkerung und globalen Umweltbelangen. In Hormus verschärft die Blockade der Meerenge die prekären Arbeitsbedingungen von Seeleuten und hat globale Folgen, die Haushalte in der Golfregion und weit darüber hinaus treffen. Während die multilaterale Zusammenarbeit im Bereich der Ozeane an Fahrt gewinnt, kehrt die Meerespolitik zu vertrauten Mustern zurück: Militarisierung, Kontrolle von Seewegen und Ressourcengier werden gerechtfertigt mit Sorgen über strategische Bedrohungen.

Globale Meerespolitik zwischen Korridorlogik und planetarischem Denken

In der Meerespolitik galt die Hohe See lange als offener Raum, geprägt vom Spannungsverhältnis zwischen freier Bewegung und Begrenzung. Doch diese Freiheit war nie universell. Uneingeschränkte Bewegungsfreiheit hat es nie gegeben. Über Jahrtausende prägten ausgehandelte Zugangsrechte und Besteuerung maritime Ordnungen, aus denen eine „Korridorlogik“ entstand, in der Mobilität auf asymmetrischen Beziehungen beruht. In der Arktis befördert das schmelzende Eis einen „Ressourcenoptimismus“ und geostrategische Überlegungen, die die Einbettung der Region in globale gesellschaftliche und ökologische Transformationen und deren Auswirkungen auf die rund vier Millionen dort lebenden Menschen kaum berücksichtigen.

Das UN-Seerechtsübereinkommen (UNCLOS), das den rechtlichen Rahmen für alle maritimen und meeresbezogenen Aktivitäten bildet, galt als für die 1990er Jahre ungewöhnlich weitreichende Form planetarischen Denkens. Allerdings verfestigte es auch Trennungen, die zunehmend infrage gestellt werden: zwischen Oberfläche und Tiefe, Wassersäule und Meeresboden, Schifffahrtswegen und Fischgründen, Unterseekabelrouten und Militärzonen. Die verfassungspolitische Debatte in Chile um das „Maritorio“ versteht das Meer hingegen als lebendiges Territorium. Indigene, die die Arktis als ihre Heimat bezeichnen und die erneute Aufmerksamkeit für afro-asiatische maritime Verflechtungen erinnern daran, dass Meerespolitik nie allein in den Händen konventioneller Sicherheits- und Verteidigungsakteure lag. Über wissenschaftspolitische Plattformen wie die UN-Ozeandekade hinaus wird die neue regionale Meerespolitik so zunehmend von Fragen zu Erbe, Erinnerung und den asymmetrischen Abhängigkeiten geprägt, die scheinbar getrennte maritime Räume miteinander verbinden. Dadurch werden auch die Gründe hinterfragt, warum das Meer für Kapital, Energie, Rohstoffe, Daten und militärische Mobilität offen bleibt, Schifffahrtswege und Energiekorridore aber gesichert und Migrationsrouten kriminalisiert werden.

Zusammenarbeit im Bereich der Ozeane muss daher auch die Kosten der Aufrechterhaltung bestehender Systeme in den Blick nehmen. Sie erfordert eine Auseinandersetzung mit dem marinen Transit- und Zugangsregime – nicht nur als Bewegung über das Meer, sondern auch im Hinblick auf Arbeit, ökologische Überlebensbedingungen und die Lebenswelten, die den Ozean zu mehr als einer bloßen Route machen.

Wohin steuert die globale Meerespolitik?

Die globale Meerespolitik erfordert eine kritischere Auseinandersetzung mit den Verbindungen von Land- und Meeresräumen und geopolitischem Denken in Korridoren und Grenzräumen, sowie die Stärkung planetarischer Perspektiven. Die Diskussion über den möglichen Standort des BBNJ-Sekretariats in China zeigt, dass das BBNJ zudem eine hervorragende Gelegenheit bietet, um die globale Zusammenarbeit zu erneuern. Neben höheren Investitionen in kritisches Meereswissen, wie es die UN-Ozeandekade vorsieht, braucht es eine mutige politische Führung, die anerkennt, dass Meeresräume und maritime Dynamiken für Energiesicherheit, Ernährungssysteme, Klimaschutz und Lebensgrundlagen entscheidend sind. Der damit verbundene Reflexionsprozess ist eine Möglichkeit, die globale Zusammenarbeit im Bereich der Ozeane neu zu denken und politische Strukturen zur Bewältigung kollektiver Herausforderungen neu zu gestalten, in denen die Wechselbeziehungen zwischen Menschen, Meereslebewesen, Infrastrukturen, Märkten und unseren Lebensräumen anerkannt werden.

This chapter describes science-policy interfaces (SPIs) as an opportunity to support sustainable development by bridging the knowledge-action gap and fostering evidence-based policies. The biggest challenges of sustainable development presented and discussed in previous chapters, including climate change, biodiversity loss, environmental injustice, and pandemics, are growing increasingly complex and uncertain. It has long been argued that for public interventions, such as policies, to more effectively address such problems and enhance sustainable development, structured evidence-based advice is needed.
Based on examples and theoretical knowledge from the literature, the chapter demonstrates how SPIs have the potential to fill knowledge gaps and foster concerted action on complex sustainability problems, specifically related to the environmental dimensions of sustainable development. Examples of prominent SPIs at the global scale are the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), which we explore in depth later in the chapter.
The chapter also presents the scholarly discourse on the effectiveness of SPIs in brief, emphasising the importance of being aware of the benefits and limitations of SPIs and different models of formalised knowledge co-production. While many scholars advocate for a co-production model over a linear model, the literature agrees that there is no ‘one-size-fits-all’ solution for facilitating interactions and coordination between knowledge holders, policymakers, and other stakeholders to effectively enhance sustainable development and synergies between interventions. When talking about sustainable development, social-political contexts need to be considered because sustainability issues are inherently interlinked and political, as reiterated in previous chapters. This chapter emphasises that effective science-policy engagement requires a two-way, iterative knowledge exchange. This approach is essential for operationalising a co-production model that incorporates diverse perspectives and knowledge systems—an indispensable factor in addressing the complex, interlinked challenges of sustainable development. Building on the previous chapter’s exploration of the growing significance of science-policy interactions in sustainable development, we want to offer a behind-the-scenes perspective on the dynamics of major intergovernmental organisations shaping the science-policy interface.

Extraordinary meeting of the International Trade Committee and joint meeting with the Internal Market Committee and the Industry Committee. Both on Tuesday 2 June
Committee on International Trade

Source : © European Union, 2026 - EP

Drawing on interviews with Zambian officials, bureaucrats, and both Chinese and Zambian professionals in the digital sector, this policy brief examines how Zambian actors have engaged with Chinese-financed digital projects across two administrations: the Patriotic Front (PF) government under Edgar Lungu (2015–2021) and the United Party for National Development (UPND) government under Hakainde Hichilema (2021–present). It argues that the transition from the PF to the UPND widened bureaucratic room for manoeuvre in managing Chinese digital projects, yet these gains remained limited and sometimes fragile, as they were partly offset by personnel reshuffling and relatively weak institutional continuity.

The 2026 US–Israel–Iran war and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz have triggered one of the largest oil supply disruptions in modern history. Brent crude prices rose sharply, producing a major external shock for oil-importing developing economies at a moment when the international development system was already under severe strain. Petrochemical products shipped through the strait are also vital for agriculture, medicine and industry. The largest contraction on record of official development assistance (ODA) had already been recorded in 2025, while geopolitical tensions and rising defence expenditures are reshaping ODA spending priorities and development policy directions.
This brief examines how the oil shock will impact development cooperation. The significance of the oil shock lies not only in the price increase itself but also in its timing, and it arrives amid an ongoing reconfiguration of development cooperation. The analysis is organised around two postulates that underpin the post–Cold War development architecture. The first is the existence of states in the Global South with sufficient authority and developmental aspirations and capacity to pursue broad-based development goals. The second is the existence of donor countries willing and able to support those states’ aspirations.
The oil shock weakens both postulates through different mechanisms. For many oil-importing developing countries, rising fuel, food and transport costs intensify fiscal stress, debt vulnerabilities and pressures on state capacity. Fragile states without strategic importance are especially exposed. At the same time, donor countries face mounting pressures
from fiscal tightening, defence spending, domestic cost-of-living politics and growing scepticism towards multilateralism. These dynamics risk reinforcing one another in the sense that weakening state capacity can intensify instability, while rising instability may further reduce political support for development co-operation in donor countries.
The brief argues that alternative financing sources such as Gulf finance, South–South cooperation and climate finance are unlikely to compensate for the scale of OECD donors’ retrenchment. The likely result is a more fragmented, transactional and geographically selective development cooperation system, in which the countries most in need are increasingly among the least likely to receive sustained support unless they hold geopolitical importance.
Three policy implications follow from the war. First, the multilateral development financing architecture requires urgent bolstering. Instruments such as the World Bank’s International Development Association and the IMF’s Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust face growing pressure precisely as low-income countries (LICs) confront simultaneous food, fuel, debt and financing shocks. Second, the increasing concentration of concessional finance to strategically prioritised states should not be treated as inevitable. Fragile states risk declining concessional finance and multilateral reach despite acute humanitarian need. Third, European donors must decide whether development cooperation remains anchored in poverty reduction or becomes subordinated to defence, migration and geopolitical priorities.

Professor Andy Sumner is a professor of International Development at King’s College London and President of the European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes.

Financial constraints are one of the most severe obstacles for the operation and development of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), especially in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Yet women and women-led enterprises are disproportionally affected, which leads to a gender gap in access to finance. This paper uses panel estimation techniques, namely a correlated random effects model, for 1,655 financial institutions from 109 mostly LMICs for the years 2000 to 2019 to examine empirically whether there are purely economic incentives for financial institutions to scale up their lending activities towards women and women-led enterprises. Going beyond the microfinance sector, this study provides – to the best of my knowledge – the first empirical evidence on this question for banks and bank-like financial institutions that serve higher credit market segments. I find positive and significant effects on the quality of the loan portfolio (lower portfolio at risk), income streams (higher portfolio yield) and the overall financial performance (captured by return on assets or profit margin). Since economic incentives and profitability considerations are crucial in steering the decisions of financial institutions with regard to credit allocations, the banks’ self-interest could lead to management decisions and internal directives to favor female loan applicants, which could contribute to closing the gender gap in access to finance. Furthermore, the findings on the positive effects on banks’ financial performance give policymakers and regulators leeway to push financial institutions through more restrictive policy measures and regulatory requirements to direct more loans to women and women-led firms.

Demonstration plots (demo plots) are crucial for knowledge dissemination and knowledge production to and with smallholder farmers in sub-Saharan Africa, making them important in rural development. Beyond their agricultural extension function considerations, their political and ecological dynamics remain undertheorized. Drawing on qualitative empirical data across Mbeya Region, Tanzania, we analyze the political ecology of different demonstration plots as assemblages deployed by private-sector actors, NGOs/grassroots organizations, and research institutions, to shape agricultural transformation. Our study reveals stark power asymmetries: private sector and research-led demo plots, strategically located and strongly resourced, dominate both physical and discursive landscapes. Their alliance building and branding practices territorialize monocultures, input-dependent farming as aspired futures. Conversely, the more conservation-oriented grassroots demo plots, despite retaining agroforestry socioecological systems, fostering local knowledge and diverse practices, are marginalized by resource constraints and limited institutional support, exposing their territories to constant erasure. Using assemblage theory, we scrutinize demo plots as active sites of socio-technical selection, configuring actors, spaces, and knowledge systems in ways that privilege market integration through intensification, while sidelining alternatives. The analysis challenges prevailing narratives of demo plots as neutral (even apolitical) pedagogical tools, instead arguing to understand them as instruments of power that determine which agricultural futures materialize.

The European Investment Bank (EIB), the world’s largest multilateral financial institution, has supported projects in over 160 countries, including fragile and conflict-affected states (FCSs). Following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the EIB adopted its first Strategic Approach to Fragility and Conflict in 2022. While the bank has a history of operating in FCSs, this strategy signals its ambition to strengthen the bank’s focus on state fragility. What is driving this shift and how does it align with the EIB’s traditional emphasis on financial sustainability and risk aversion? This paper examines the drivers of the EIB’s engagement with fragile states through an institutional logics lens, identifying three core logics embedded in the bank’s identity: development, investment and bureaucratic logics. The analysis shows that although development and bureaucratic logics strongly shape the new strategy, the investment logic – anchored in financial prudence – continues to influence lending practices. This finding suggests that the progressive rhetoric on fragility is constrained by institutional caution.

While both states share dissatisfaction with the Western-led international order and seek a more multipolar system, the summit revealed important differences.

Afghanistan’s path to international recognition and fuller participation in the global community depends, in part, on the approach the European Union chooses to take.

A delegation from the Employment and Social Affairs Committee was in La Réunion to assess youth employment initiatives and to meet government representatives.
Committee on Employment and Social Affairs

Source : © European Union, 2026 - EP

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

Council agrees position to simplify and strengthen food and feed safety requirements.