VILNIUS – Six Lithuanians who lost relatives during Moscow’s crackdown on the Baltic state’s independence drive filed a lawsuit against former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev on Thursday. The group initiated legal action 31 years to the day since the January 1991 assault, which killed 14 civilians and wounded over 700. In 2019, a Lithuanian court … Read more
BRUSSELS, Jan 4, 2022 (AFP) – An EU ban on tattoo ink and permanent make-up containing chemicals feared to cause cancers or other health risks went into effect on Tuesday, officials said. The prohibition covers hazardous substances such as certain azo dyes, carcinogenic aromatic amines, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), metals and methanol. “The restriction covers carcinogenic, mutagenic and … Read more
PARIS: A record number of companies made their market debut on the Euronext index in 2021 as the pan-European exchange benefitted from Brexit and added Milan to the group, the operator said on Thursday. Euronext said 212 companies were newly listed this year for a total market capitalisation of €123 billion ($139 billion), but it … Read more
MADRID: Spain’s fragmented parliament gave final approval on Tuesday to the biggest budget in the country’s history, with billions of euros from EU’s huge Covid-19 recovery fund. Passage of the 2022 spending plan boosts the chances that Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s minority government will survive until the end of its mandate in late 2023. Lawmakers … Read more
German consumer sentiment worsened for the second month running, a key survey said on Tuesday, as Europe’s largest economy braces itself for rising inflation and the spread of the Omicron coronavirus variant. Pollster GfK’s forward-looking barometer fell to -6.8 from a revised figure of -1.8 for December. “The high incidence of the virus due to … Read more
Portugal next year could approve lithium mining that will reduce Europe’s dependence on outside sources for a key ingredient in the frenetic global race to decarbonise the auto industry. The southern European nation is thought to have the continent’s largest lithium reserves. Alongside nickel and cobalt, lithium has become a prized raw material as it … Read more
FRANKFURT: German consumer sentiment worsened for the second month running, a key survey said on Tuesday, as Europe’s largest economy braces itself for rising inflation and the spread of the Omicron coronavirus variant. Pollster GfK’s forward-looking barometer fell to -6.8 from a revised figure of -1.8 for December. “The high incidence of the virus due to … Read more
BRUSSELS, Dec 16, 2021 (AFP) – The lightning spread of Omicron in Europe and elsewhere added a sense of urgency to an EU summit on Thursday, with leaders struggling to present a united, bloc-wide approach. Projections that the highly infectious Covid strain could be dominant in the EU as early as next month have pushed the … Read more
BRATISLAVA: The Slovak government allowed shops, ski resorts and churches to reopen Friday to those who are vaccinated or have recovered from Covid, despite having the highest infection rate in the world. The EU member of 5.4 million people, which went into partial lockdown late last month, registered 1,099 cases per 100,000 people over the … Read more
ROME: Italian regulators hit Amazon with a 1.1 billion euros ($1.3 billion) antitrust fine on Thursday for allegedly abusing its dominance in the market, the latest action against US Big Tech in the EU. US technology giants have been in the firing line in the European Union over their business practices. In the latest salvo, Italy’s … Read more
PARIS: A growing number of countries are taking on gig economy giants like Uber, Bolt and Deliveroo by giving their workers, who are routinely treated as freelancers, full employment rights. With the European Union executive tabling new proposals on Thursday to clear up the grey area, here is a snapshot of recent decisions shaking up the … Read more
ISLAMABAD: The European Union (EU) has welcomed the progress made by Pakistan to implement the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) action plans and also lauded adoption of the “Protection of Journalists and Media Professionals Bill” by the parliament, that later became an act with the presidential approval. A joint communiqué issued early Wednesday at the … Read more
WASHINGTON: Strong American export business caused a large drop in the US trade deficit last month, even as imports also rose, according to government data released on Tuesday. The gap between imports and exports of goods and services dropped 17.6 per cent to $67.1 billion last month, bringing the trade deficit down from a record … Read more
MADRID: Spanish inflation accelerated in November to its highest level in nearly three decades on the back of rising food and gas prices, official data showed on Monday. Consumer prices jumped 5.6 per cent, up from a 5.4 per cent increase in October, according to the preliminary figures from the national statistics institute. That is its … Read more
KARACHI: Bint-e-Fatima Foundation started as small charity at home back in 2008 and now has been adobe for more than 100 mothers from Karachi, Islamabad, and Lahore, a statement said. After 11 years in 2019, Bint-e- Fatima Foundation’s services were recognised and awarded by Nation Peace Award in the Presence of Maulana Abdul Khabeer Azaad … Read more
BRUSSELS – The European Union will slap sanctions on Belarus over the migrant crisis in the “coming days”, after the bloc’s foreign ministers gave their backing, Brussels’ top diplomat Josep Borrell said Monday. After meeting the ministers, Borrell said the new sanctions would hit “quite an important number” of individuals and entities for “facilitating illegal border crossings … Read more
GLASGOW: Corporate carbon polluters plant trees to counter their CO2 emissions, but activists warn against greenwashing and say such afforestation schemes detract from the emissions reductions needed to combat climate change. Voluntary carbon offsetting is being hotly debated at the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow. Here’s a backgrounder. How does it work? Carbon offsetting is when a company … Read more
VIENNA: Anti-Semitism has grown during the coronavirus pandemic, particularly online, a new EU report said on Tuesday, but gaps in data make it difficult to measure how bad the problem really is. As well as old lies being revived, “new anti-Semitic myths and conspiracy theories that blame Jews for the pandemic have come to the … Read more
VELIKA KLADUSA: Huddled around cooking fires as winter looms in Bosnia, refugees are risking beatings and humiliation from Croatian police in the desperate hope of a new life in the European Union. Largely from Afghanistan, many of them have endured months or years of flight from war and poverty, only to be met by Croatian … Read more
LONDON – A 25-year-old man has been charged with murder, after British MP David Amess was stabbed to death last week, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) and police said on Thursday. Ali Harbi Ali, who was arrested at the scene of the killing in Leigh-on-Sea, east of London, last Friday, also faces a separate charge of … Read more
PARIS: Facebook on Monday announced plans to hire 10,000 people in the European Union to build the “metaverse”, a virtual reality version of the internet that the tech giant sees as the future. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been a leading voice in Silicon Valley hype around the idea of the metaverse, which would blur … Read more
ISLAMABAD: Minister for Information and Broadcasting Chaudhry Fawad Hussain said on Friday that the greatest challenge being faced by the modern media was the dissemination of false propaganda through fake news. Addressing a seminar on “politics and journalism in the age of fake news” organized by Arab News he said that the phenomenon of fake … Read more
GENEVA: The European Union on Thursday won its battle at the UN Human Rights Council to create a new special rapporteur on Afghanistan, despite opposition from China, Russia and Pakistan. The rapporteur will be responsible for monitoring the rights situation in the country following the Taliban takeover and will make recommendations on improvements. “This is an … Read more
BRDO. European Union (EU) leaders told frustrated Balkan counterparts at a summit on Wednesday the bloc remains committed to letting them join, but offered no concrete progress on their stalled membership bids. The 27-nation club talked up economic support worth billions of euros for its eastern neighbours at a rain-drenched gathering at Brdo castle in Slovenia, … Read more
COLOMBO. Sri Lanka’s president vowed ‘immediate steps’ to amend anti-terror legislation to retain the European Union (EU)’s generalised system of preferences (GSP Plus) status, his office said on Tuesday. The EU had warned Sri Lanka that its lucrative trade status — a favourable trade scheme to encourage developing nations to respect human rights — could be withdrawn if Colombo … Read more
According to news agency Reuters, British petrol stations are still witnessing extraordinary demand, with over two thousand pumps remained dry on Thursday despite the country’s fuel crisis. During an unrestrained week in which battles erupted at gas stations and individuals filled up old water bottles with gasoline, one man was recorded riding his horse up … Read more
Pakistan to maintain the Generalized Preferential System Plus (GSP-Plus) status in European Unions. European Union published a statement, in which the EU has presented six new agreements for Pakistan that are connected to providing services to people with physical disabilities, tackling climate change, and child labor. “In the latest review, Pakistan’s individual status was not … Read more
European governments have spent hand over fist, despite ballooning public debt, to prevent the coronavirus pandemic from triggering economic calamity. Now, the European Union faces calls to loosen its budget rules to allow the largesse to continue, but the topic is a sensitive one for many member states. The European Commission, the EU executive that … Read more
