Seven countries join forces to build a European drone
France, Germany, Greece, Italy, The Netherlands, Poland and Spain have signed an agreement on Tuesday (19 November) to build an unmanned aircraft by 2020 and challenge the dominance of the United States and Israel on a market seen as strategic.
Defence ministers meeting in Brussels instructed the European Defence Agency (EDA), the European Union’s defence arm, to start studying the military requirements and costs of a future EU surveillance drone that could be produced after 2020.
MAIN FOCUS: EU Parliament votes to end “travelling circus” | 21/11/2013
The European Parliament voted on Wednesday by a large majority in favour of being allowed to choose for itself where it holds its sessions. Many MEPs want to see an end to the continual commuting between Strasbourg and Brussels. This costly travelling circusprovides welcome ammunition for anti-Europeans, some commentators argue. Others point out that France will never agree to giving up the Strasbourg headquarters.
Bulgaria: students to the rescue
A prolonged crisis in Bulgaria exposes the bankruptcy of an entire political system in desperate need of renewal, says Dimitar Bechev.
ECB debate comes full circle back to QE again – but substantial obstacles remain
As with many things in the eurozone crisis, we have now come full circle in the discussion of one part of ECB policy ? the prospect of Quantitative Easing (QE).
The debate over ECB QE was had when the crisis was at its peak. The motivating factor then was ensuring the euro stayed together. Now the motivating factor is low inflation/fear of deflation and low growth. The ultimate conclusion back then was that QE is not the right policy for the ECB (compared to the Fed or the BoE) for a number of practical and political reasons.
Iran talks ‘very substantial and detailed’: EU Talks on Thursday between Iran’s foreign minister and world powers’ chief negotiator Catherine Ashton were “very substantial and detailed,” Ashton’s spokesman said. |
EU ministers ‘losing patience’ with Greece: Eurogroup Eurozone finance ministers are “losing patience” with Greece, Eurogroup president Jeroen Dijsselbloem told a Greek daily as the crisis-hit country prepared to unveil its next budget on Thursday. |
EU seven-year budget adopted by MEPs
The European Parliament gives final approval to the EU’s budget for 2014-2020 after months of hard bargaining.
Ukraine before the Vilnius summit: time to summarize No matter the result, the Vilnius summit of the Eastern partnership will be historical for Eastern Europe, Ukraine, the EU and even for Russia. The eve of the summit is a good occasion to summarise the last year of preparations made by Kyiv, writes Valeriy Kucheruk. Valeriy Kucheruk is a Ukrainian political expert. |
France and Italy call for permanent eurozone president
France and Italy called yesterday (20 November) for eurozone finance ministers to have a full-time chairman after the European Parliament elections in May.
Speaking after meeting with Italian Prime Minister Enrico Letta in Rome, French President François Hollande said the euro zone needed to complete its banking union and set up a joint borrowing mechanism to finance investment.
Poland has long been the subject of offensive stereotypes and a hostile UK media. Our new Spotlight on Poland hopes to shine a light on this
misunderstood country.
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