Euobserver.com

EU finance ministers agreed on a new set of rules for value-added tax, opening the door to lower taxes for environmentally-friendly products.

Central and eastern European countries are diverse - but an increasing mistrust in government and a quick spread of conspiracy theories seem to be a common thread between them.

Lacking any monetary policy instruments and fiscal discipline, the economy in the north of Cyprus is suffering the consequences of the recent unorthodox and controversial monetary policy decisions made in Turkey.

A deep-dive into the new German coalition government's thinking on Hungary, Poland, Russia, Ukraine and the 'ever-closer' federal state of the EU itself.

EU diplomats have provisionally agreed to blacklist three Russian nationals and one entity, the 'Wagner Group' mercenary outfit, on grounds of human rights abuses in Africa and the Middle East, diplomatic sources said. The decision will be formalised by foreign ministers next Monday. The move comes amid Wagner's increasing presence in Mali, threatening French interests in the region. Europe earlier sanctioned a Russian oligarch, Yevgeny Prigozhin, said to fund Wagner.

Germany has urgesd Iran to present realistic proposals in talks over its nuclear programme, a foreign ministry spokeswoman said, adding that offers Tehran made last week almost all violated earlier agreements, Reuters reports. Its proposals were "not a basis for a successful end to talks," she said. "We reviewed the proposals ... carefully and thoroughly and concluded that Iran violated almost all compromises found previously in months of hard negotiations."

The US has said it would send reinforcements to eastern Europe in response to a Russian invasion of Ukraine, as well as imposing severe new economic measures, in a warning to Moscow on the eve of talks between presidents Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin, The Guardian writes. Biden will also make clear to Putin the US will not rule out future Ukrainian membership of Nato, a senior US official said.

The US has announced a diplomatic boycott of China's Winter Olympics in February citing its "egregious human rights abuses" against the Uighur minority and posing the question if the UK and EU allies will follow suit by asking their officials to stay away too. The Chinese embassy in Washington said the move was a "grave distortion of the Olympic Charter". US athletes will still be allowed to compete.

Some 277 million passengers travelled by air in the EU in 2020, a decrease of 73 percent on the previous year, according to statistics published by Eurostat on Monday. All EU countries registered a reduction of air transport last year, but the highest drop was observed for Slovenia, Slovakia and Croatia. The aviation industry was severely hit by the Covid-19 pandemic, after countries imposed strict travel restrictions.

The European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen said on Monday that the EU is "the biggest donor of Covid-19 vaccines in the world", after it shared more than 350 million doses with the rest of the world. She also said that the majority of these vaccines, around 300 million, where shared via the international aid programme COVAX. Some 44 percent of the world population is currently vaccinated, she said.

The majority of EU citizens are worried about the increasing role of digital tools and the internet in the society, a new Eurobarometer survey showed Monday. 56 percent of respondents are worried about cyber-attacks, 53 percent are nervous about their children's safety and 46 percent are concerned about the use of private data. 41 percent expect that the internet and the use of digital tools will bring them advantages.

The EU watchdog has found no proof of manipulation of the carbon markets, allaying European Commission fears. However, the European Securities and Markets Authority did note that it had only limited access to essential data.

The Slovenian government has finally decided to nominate two delegated prosecutors for the European Public Prosecutors Office (EPPO), but the EPPO still has to decide if they are suitable.

Austria will become the first country in western Europe to reimpose a full lockdown to tackle a new wave of Covid infections, and will require its whole population to be vaccinated as of February, Reuters writes. Austria has one of the lowest vaccination-rates in western Europe. Austria introduced a lockdown for all those who were unvaccinated on Monday but since then infections have continued to set new records.

France will push for motion on migration when it hosts the European Union presidency from January, president Emmanuel Macron said on Thursday, Reuters reports. "We should take a number of actions: stop the institution of lasting camps, act to dismantle the smuggling networks, and strengthen work with the international locations of origin to stop these flows," he said, adding "I'll carry reforms under the French presidency of the EU."

Slovenian interior minister Aleš Hojs, whose country chairs the EU presidency said the EU should seal its borders to prevent people coming to claim asylum in line with their international rights. "I believe external borders must be secured, even with fences if necessary ... There is no more 'Refugees Welcome'," he said at a conference in Sarajevo Thursday. He also said movements of "illegal" migrants were "destabilising the European Union".

China has verbally attacked Lithuania for opening a 'Taiwan Representation Office' in Vilnius, breaking with a convention in which Taiwan's de facto embassies called themselves 'Taipei' offices instead as a euphemism. "We demand that the Lithuanian side immediately correct its wrong decision," the Chinese foreign ministry said calling Lithuania's move an "extremely egregious act" and saying Taiwan's aspirations to be recognised as an independent sate were "doomed to fail".

NGOs on Thursday slammed the new transparency policy of the European Investment Bank (EIB) for not following recommendations from the EU ombudsman on disclosing information of the projects it finances. The EIB is not obliged to publish the projects it selects for funding, the role of financial intermediaries like commercial banks and investment funds, the criteria of selection or the environmental impact of such projects.

Russian president Vladimir Putin said the West is "escalating" the Ukraine conflict by holding drills in the Black Sea, AFP writes. His comments come as the US accuses Moscow of a troop build-up near Ukraine. "(Our) Western partners are escalating the situation by supplying Kyiv with lethal modern weapons and conducting provocative manoeuvres in the Black Sea," Putin said, claiming that Western bombers are flying "20km from our border."

Doctors without Borders' (MSF) rescue boat - GeoBarents - is seeking to disembark 186 people it has rescued in the Mediterranean Sea. The NGO had also recovered 10 corpses earlier this week from a boat with 99 survivors. "Some had to identify the dead bodies of family members or friends who perished in front of their eyes," said MSF.