European Union

Romania plans to buy the famous sculpture The Wisdom of the Earth by iconic Romanian sculptor Constantin Brâncuși from its current private owners for 11 million euros. However the Romanian government's plan is to put just five million towards the purchase and gather the remaining sum through donations by the end of September. Can this crowdfunding initiative help unite the country?

The Kurdish terrorist organisation the Kurdistan Freedom Falcons claimed responsibility on Thursday for last Sunday's attack in Ankara. It said the bombing, which claimed 37 lives, was a retaliatory strike for the Turkish military's operations in the southeast of the country. How can the situation in Turkey be defused?

Russia has begun its partial withdrawal from Syria but its naval base in Tartus and its air base in Latakia will remain in operation. Some commentators say President Vladimir Putin's 'surprise' announcement was a logical step since he has achieved all his military objectives. Others speculate that Putin has withdrawn solely for domestic reasons.

The British Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne has announced a new tax on sugary soft drinks aimed at combatting child obesity. What can the sugar tax accomplish?

In an unprecedented move the ECB lowered the base interest rate to zero percent on Thursday. It also extended its bond-buying programme and increased the rates banks must pay for parking their deposits with the ECB. Can the flood of cheap money jump-start Europe's economy?

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ASTANA – Kazakhstan will not opt to purchase shares of BG Group in the Karachaganak Petroleum Operating (KPO) consortium, Kazakh national company KazMunayGas head Sauat Mynbayev said on March 17 in Astana.

The merger of the Anglo-Dutch oil and gas giant Royal Dutch Shell and of the British oil company BG Group was completed in February of this year.

As reported, according to the laws of Kazakhstan, after the completion of this deal government of Kazakhstan can opt to purchase shares of BG Group in the Karachaganak field. “No, we will not opt to purchase shares of BG, Shell is a potential buyer,” Mynbayev said at the briefing, responding to a question of journalists.

Karachaganak field is controlled by a group of investors, which, in addition to the BG Group, include ENI (29,25%), Chevron (18%), LUKoil (13.5%) and KazMunaiGas (10%).

As noted on the website BG Group, As noted on the website BG Group, production at the field is conducted at the highest level and is about 45% of the total gas production in Kazakhstan and 16% liquid hydrocarbons.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the Karachaganak field is about 15% of the total production of BG Group and 9% of its revenues in 2014 in the amount of $19 billion.

The Karachaganak field, discovered in 1979, is one of the world’s largest gas and condensate fields. Located in north-west Kazakhstan and covering an area of over 280 square kilometres, it holds estimated hydrocarbons initially in place (HIIP) of 9 billion barrels of condensate and 48 trillion cubic feet of gas, with estimated gross reserves of over 2.4 billion barrels of condensate and 16 trillion cubic feet of gas.

The post Kazakhstan not to buy the shares of BG Group in KPO consortium appeared first on New Europe.

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A Bucharest court upheld a two year sentence for a Romanian MP on corruption charges; the court of appeal sustained that offering his voters fried chicken was indeed bribery.

Exchanging food for votes in rural areas in not unheard of in Romania; it is usually flour and oil. Florian Popescu went the extra mile.

During the 2012 Romanian legislative elections, candidate Florin Popescu distributed no less than 60 tons of fried chicken worth €108,000.

Since the first trial in 2014, Popescu had been known with the nickname “Chicken Baron.” He protested he did not have the time to east even one chicken wing.

Popescu resigned his post as an MP in March 2nd.

Romania ranked 58th in the corruption perception index of transparency international in 2015 making strands from its 69th place in 2014.  In 2015, the famous Romanian National Anti-Corruption Agency (DNA) was pursuing 10,000 cases and was believed to be going after a third of the country’s business and political elite. Nonetheless, a Council of Europe report published in January 2016 asked Romania to do more to promote transparency, especially as at a legislative level, where the report notes “gifts” and “conflict of interest” are not unknown.

However, the use of food rather than hard cash points towards a related to corruption challenge. Besides having a serious corruption challenge, according to Eurostat, Romania has the second biggest population in Europe after Bulgaria in risk of poverty and social exclusion.

(with AP, The Telegraph)

The post Jail time for Romanian MP trading votes for chicken appeared first on New Europe.

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Nearly half of Thailand’s monks are severely overweight, according to a new study. And now the government has launched a health drive among its clerics.

A new study revealed that 48% of the country’s monks are obese and face numerous physiological problems as a result.

An academic directing the health-awareness campaign told the Bangkok Post that about 10% of the clergy suffer from diabetes, while 23% have high blood pressure and 42% show excessive levels of cholesterol.

“Obesity in our monks is a ticking time bomb,” Jongjit Angkatavanich, the academic from the Faculty of Allied Health Sciences at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok, told the Post.

The monks are often given foods laden with high fat and sugar content by devotees, which they are reportedly forbidden from refusing.

Meanwhile, the Thai government, which pays the monks’ medical expenses, reportedly spent in excess of $8.5m on them in 2012 alone.

According to The Telegraph, the obesity epidemic in Thailand seems to contradict the requirements of the monastic lifestyle. They’re supposed to live strict, plain lives, reject materialism and excess, and spend their time in meditation. But in Thailand, Buddhism isn’t without scandal. Several financial, sexual, and lifestyle controversies have befallen senior clerics and its former spiritual leader (they’re currently lacking one) has been accused of tax evasion.

The post Thailand’s Buddhist monks eating their way to obesity, taking big bites out of state health budget appeared first on New Europe.

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A Russian MP prepares a law that criminalizes any comment perceived as an insult against the Russian Presidency.

The draft law is being prepared by Russian MP Roman Khudyakov, member of the nationalist Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR). The maximum penalty would be up to six years in jail. Khudyakov said the draft law was in response to several YouTube videos purportedly criticizing the Russian president, Vladimir Putin.

According to Newsweek, Khudyakov told national daily newspaper Izvestia that he started preparing the bill after citizens from his Tambov region alerted him to the videos mocking Putin. “They asked me how such videos can exist for the public to access,” Khudyakov said and added, “when I watched it I was outraged to the depths of my soul.”

The Russian MP said that he had decided to model the new bill on the 1990 law “On the protection of the honor and dignity of the president of the USSR.” Russian website, RT, reported that according to the current Russian law, insults against the Russian president can be qualified as insulting a state official, which is a criminal offense punishable by up to one year of hard labor.

The deputy head of the Russian Parliament’s Committee for Criminal Law, Sergey Fabrichnyi of the parliamentary majority United Russia party, said that he saw no obstructions to discussing Khudyakov’s proposal.

A similar law is in force in Turkey, and the Turkish authorities have used it numerous times for persecuting citizens who insulted, Turkish President, Recep Tayyip Erdogan

The post Russian MP prepares law against insulting the President appeared first on New Europe.

The public hearing "The crisis in Syria and the role of international and regional actors: security implications for Europe" was be held on 16 March with researchers closely working on the issue and a representative from the EEAS. The hearing provided a better understanding of the situation on the ground, a vital requirement for bringing the conflict to an end.
Location : Altiero Spinelli 3G-2
Programme
Programme
Presentation
Presentation by Michael Benhamou
Source : © European Union, 2016 - EP

General : If you use Facebook and Google your personal data such as photos and email are usually stored in US data centres. Sending Europeans' data across the Atlantic is legal provided American companies commit themselves to respecting EU privacy standards. On Thursday, MEPs discussed a new mechanism for transferring data across the Atlantic with experts. Read on to find out why it was created and watch the interview with Max Schrems who was responsible for getting the previous arrangement scrapped.

Source : © European Union, 2016 - EP

General : If you use Facebook and Google your personal data such as photos and email are usually stored in US data centres. Sending Europeans' data across the Atlantic is legal provided American companies commit themselves to respecting EU privacy standards. On Thursday, MEPs discussed a new mechanism for transferring data across the Atlantic with experts. Read on to find out why it was created and watch the interview with Max Schrems who was responsible for getting the previous arrangement scrapped.

Source : © European Union, 2016 - EP