Page 43 - European Union

Bavarian Nordic seeks EU's approval to extend mpox vaccine to adolescents

Mpox has been declared a global public health emergency by the World Health Organization, with children and adolescents being particularly vulnerable to the disease

EU estimate: Wildfire near Athens burned area twice the size of Manhattan

A European Union satellite mapping agency says 104 square kilometres (40 square miles) of land was burned northeast of Athens this week during a deadly wildfire that gutted scores of homes and prompted multiple countries to send assistance. The Copernicus Emergency Management Service announced the damage estimate Wednesday, a day after the wildfire was contained in a massive effort that ended on the outskirts of the capital. A factory worker was killed in the fire that swept through mountainous areas southward, covering an area almost twice the size of Manhattan and blanketing the Greek capital with a thick cloud of smoke. The fire damaged 22 businesses and rendered at least 78 homes uninhabitable, with nearly half of them completely destroyed, Greek officials said Wednesday. Inspections in fire-afflicted areas will continue in coming days. Nine countries, including neighbor Turkey, sent assistance to Greece to boost ground crews and water-dropping planes and helicopters operating

Iran rejects European leaders' call to refrain from retaliatory attacks

The European leaders also endorsed the latest push by mediators from Qatar, Egypt and the United States to broker an agreement to end the Israel-Hamas war

Residents of Serbia's lithium-rich region pledge to block EU-backed mining

Zlatko Kokanovic does not want a lithium mine in his backyard and he will do anything he can to stop it from opening. All of us here, we are ready to lose our lives," the 48-year farmer told The Associated Press. "They can shoot. That is the only way they can open the mine. At stake is a lush farming valley in western Serbia that holds one of Europe's richest deposits of lithium, a precious metal that is used to make batteries for electric cars and is crucial for the global transition to green energy. Whether there should be a mine in the valley or not has become one of the most contentious issues in the Balkan nation, triggering protests by thousands of people in a challenge to the populist President Aleksandar Vucic. While the government insists the mine is an opportunity for economic development, critics say it would inflict irreparable pollution on the Jadar valley, along with underground water reserves, farm land and two small rivers that run through the valley. Thousands are

TikTok agrees to withdraw rewards feature after EU raised concerns

It was the first resolution of an investigation under the 27-country EU's sweeping Digital Services Act, which went into effect in February

Febi expects to become the go-to agency for EU companies in India

A 2024 survey of German companies in India flagged bureaucratic hurdles, high corruption, and the tax system as the three biggest obstacles to doing business in India

PM Starmer announces police unit to counter violence after fatal stabbings

Prime Minister Keir Starmer said Thursday that he will create the ability for police forces to work across the UK to crack down on violent protesters after clashes with police across England on the past two nights that followed a horrific stabbing. Starmer condemned the violence by a tiny mindless minority and said: We will put a stop to it. The announcement came after police were pelted with bottles in several cities by what Starmer called marauding mobs who apparently were reacting to a stabbing Monday at a children's dance class that killed three and wounded 10. The attack at a Taylor Swift-themed summer holiday dance class shocked a country where knife crime is a long-standing and vexing problem, though mass stabbings are rare. Far-right activists have used the deaths to stoke anger at immigrants and Muslims though the suspect is not an immigrant, and his religion has not been disclosed. The announcement came as the 17-year-old boy charged with murdering three girls and stabbi

EU's suggestion on carbon tax not to help Indian firms much: GTRI

The EU's suggestion that India could avoid its carbon tax by imposing a similar levy locally will not help the domestic players much, as they would still be liable for the duty for their exports to the European Union, think tank GTRI said on Wednesday. The main issue is that carbon prices are usually based on a country's economic situation, so simply adding a local tax would not reduce the overall tax burden significantly, the Global Trade Research Initiative (GTRI) said. While the EU (European Union) can afford high carbon prices, it may not be sustainable for a developing country like India, it said. Further explaining, it said at present, the global average carbon price is around USD 6 per tonne of CO2 and if India were to establish an Emissions Trading System (ETS) or set a carbon price, it is expected to be less than USD 10 per tonne of CO2. Even with such a system, Indian firms would still need to pay the EU the difference amounting to USD 51.3 per tonne of CO2 under the Carb

EU to give Euro 2.4 mn aid for flood victims in India, B'desh, Philippines

The funding will help provide cash assistance, food, access to clean water and sanitation, and other essential services in the hardest-hit areas

Will consider EU suggestion; come up with whatever good for industry: Goyal

The EU has suggested that India can devise its own mechanism instead of paying the carbon tax to the European Union, Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal said on Tuesday. Goyal said the ministry would consider the EU's suggestion and come up with whatever is good for the Indian industry and for the people. He added India is in dialogue with the European Union (EU) on the tax or Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM). The minister said he feels the CBAM will hurt the EU "very" badly, as infrastructure, cost of living, industrial and consumer products will become expensive. The EU's economy will also face further distress that is "my reading of CBAM", Goyal said. "They (EU) are very keen to pursue that and they have offered that India could instead of paying CBAM tax to the EU, devise its own mechanism. We will consider their suggestion and come up with whatever is good for the Indian industry and for the people of India," he told reporters here. As per reports, an EU ...

Google planning to keep third-party cookies in its Chrome browser

Cookies are packets of information that allow websites and advertisers to identify individual web surfers and track their browsing habits, but they can also be used for unwanted surveillance

EU putting new pressure on Hungary's Orban over his outreach to Russia

Hungary won't be allowed to host a strategic EU meeting next month because of Prime Minister Viktor Orbn's self-proclaimed peace mission trips to Moscow and Beijing this month aimed at brokering an end to the war in Ukraine, which EU partners overwhelmingly saw as undermining their support for Kyiv. We have to send a signal, even if it is a symbolic signal, EU foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell said Monday in Brussels, explaining why he had decided that the upcoming foreign and defense ministers' meeting would take place in Brussels instead of Budapest. Hungary currently holds the rotating EU presidency, and as such had expected to host the annual late August gathering known as the Gymnich in late August. This gathering should now be held in the EU capital in September, Borrell announced. Orbn is seen as having the warmest relationship with Russia in the EU and is largely politically isolated in his stance on the Ukraine war. His government has held up sanctions on Moscow and huge

European Commission President Leyen faces vote for second 5-year term bid

Ursula von der Leyen pledged to be a strong leader for Europe in a time of crisis and polarization as she made her final leadership pitch Thursday in a speech to lawmakers at the European Parliament ahead of a vote on whether to grant her a second five-year term as president of the European Union's executive commission. The secret ballot at the 720-seat parliament comes hot on the heels of strong gains by the far right in last month's election for the European Parliament. I will never let the extreme polarization of our societies become accepted. I will never accept that demagogues and extremists destroy our European way of life. And I stand here today ready to lead the fight with all the Democratic forces in this house, von der Leyen said. If a majority of the lawmakers reject her candidacy, it would leave leaders of the 27-nation bloc scrambling to find a replacement as Europe grapples with crises ranging from the war in Ukraine to climate change. In her speech to the parliament,

EU court criticises Commission over handling of Covid vaccine contracts

The Commission signed deals with COVID vaccine supplies AstraZeneca, Sanofi, GSK, Johnson & Johnson, BioNTech, Pfizer, Moderna and others at the height of the pandemic

TikTok owner can't avoid bloc's law crackdown on digital giants: EU court

TikTok owner ByteDance can't avoid the bloc's crackdown on digital giants, a European Union court said Wednesday in a decision that found the video sharing platform falls under a new law that also covers Apple, Google and Microsoft. The EU's General Court rejected ByteDance's legal challenge against being classed as an online "gatekeeper that has to comply with extra obligations under the 27-nation bloc's Digital Markets Act. The rulebook, also known as the DMA, took effect this year and seeks to counter the dominance of Big Tech companies and make online competition fairer by giving consumers more choice. TikTok had argued that it wasn't a gatekeeper but was playing the role of a new competitor in social media taking on entrenched players like Facebook and Instagram owner Meta. The judges, however, decided that since 2018 TikTok had succeeded in increasing its number of users very rapidly and exponentially and that it had rapidly consolidated its position, and even strengthened th

EU's carbon tax mechanism expected to cost India 0.05% of GDP: Report

The European Union's Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) will impose additional 25 per cent tax on energy-intensive goods exported from India to the EU, a new report said on Wednesday. This tax burden would represent 0.05 per cent of India's GDP, according to the report titled "The Global South's response to a changing trade regime in the era of climate change" by independent think tank Centre for Science and Environment (CSE). These findings are based on data from the past three years (2021-22, 2022-23, and 2023-24). CBAM is the EU's proposed tax on energy-intensive products, such as iron, steel, cement, fertilizers, and aluminum, imported from countries like India and China. The tax is based on the carbon emissions generated during the production of these goods. The EU argues that this mechanism creates a level playing field for domestically manufactured goods, which must adhere to stricter environmental standards, and helps reduce emissions from imports. But other nations,

Google tried to offer $512 mn package to derail Microsoft antitrust pact

While Google has long trailed Amazon.com Inc. and Microsoft in the cloud market, it's begun to see impressive results

Estonia's PM Kaja Kallas steps down, to become EU's foreign policy chief

Estonia's Prime Minister Kaja Kallas has stepped down as the leader of the Baltic country to become the foreign policy chief of the European Union later this year. Kallas, Estonia's first female prime minister, handed in her formal resignation to President Alar Karis during a brief meeting at the Presidential Palace in the capital, Tallinn, on Monday. Estonia under Kallas has been one of Europe's most vocal backers of Ukraine following the full-scale Russian invasion in February 2022. Summing up Kallas' 3 1/2 years at the helm of the nation of 1.3 million, Karis was quoted as saying by the Baltic News Service that it has been a time full of crises, the milestones (such as) the coronavirus, the economic recession and the war in Europe, when Russia destroyed our previous security picture with its aggression in Ukraine. The prime minister's move automatically triggered the resignation of Kallas' three-party Cabinet, made up of her center-right Reform Party, the Social Democratic Party

EU slaps charges on Elon Musk's X over disinformation and illegal content

The EU Commission on Friday issued formal charges against X, accusing it of violating the EU's stringent social media regulations

Apple to open its tap-and-go payment tech to mobile wallet providers in EU

Apple will now allow developers to access its near field communication (NFC) technology to pre-build payment apps for rival mobile wallet providers