Europe - News About Europe/E.U.
Video /Clips/EU Policy/ http://europa.eu.int/comm/mediatheque/pro/voir_en.cfm MPEG2
2006
Google challenges EU plan to regulate the internet
By Andrew Murray-Watson
Jan 29/06 - London Telegraph - Google, the giant internet search company, is to lead industry opposition to new proposals from the European Commission to regulate online content.
Google was criticised for bowing to pressure from Beijing
The company, which last week said it would self-censor its Chinese search engine to appease the country's government, objects to the commission's proposals to extend regulations in the Television Without Frontiers directive (TWFD) to cover video content shown on the internet.
James Purnell, the minister for creative industries, has backed Google's stance.
He said: "There is no benefit to the consumer that justifies this move. This increased scope could mean significant regulation of the internet and stifle the growth of new media services. That would raise prices for consumers and deprive them of potential new services."
Existing national laws that regulate TV broadcasting - for example, the British ban on tobacco advertising and child porn - were sufficient, he added.
If the proposals became part of European law, Purnell said, "in 10 years our successors will bemoan the handicaps we gave to European industry and the restraints we put on free speech".
"For example, the proposals suggest that member states should ensure that media service providers. . . do not offer material which contains incitement to hatred on grounds of, for example, disability or age. I'm the last person to say that issues like this are not important and of course we have been discussing race and religious hatred in our own Parliament only recently.
"But what that debate showed was that these are wide-ranging issues on which there are different, strongly and legitimately held opinions and where intervention must have the strongest justification. Some member states - and I don't just mean the UK - will have serious difficulties with such an approach on grounds of freedom of speech."
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Italy warns Morocco on migrants
Other would-be migrants have drowned en route to Italy
Italy has complained to Morocco about a large increase in the number of immigrants entering Italy illegally.
The Moroccan ambassador to Italy was summoned to the foreign ministry in Rome to receive the complaint.
Italian police said the number of Moroccans and other Africans getting to Italy had increased in recent months.
They say the rise is due to the erection in September of razor wire barriers around the Spanish north African enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla.
No numbers
People prevented from entering the EU illegally through Spain now cross the Mediterranean in small boats to Italy with the help of people smugglers via Algeria and Libya, the Italian government has alleged.
Italy's Interior Minister, Giuseppe Pisanu told a cabinet meeting in Rome that one third of all illegal immigrants seeking to enter Italy during the past two months came from Morocco.
Spain has reinforced its enclave's fences
This was 15 times as many as were intercepted during the same period in
2004, he said.
The minister gave no details as to the numbers involved.
According to Medecins Sans Frontieres, the police, and charitable aid organisations between 100,000 and 250,000 people, try to enter the EU illegally each year through Italy.
Tens of thousands are regularly deported to their home countries under a stiff new immigration law passed there two years ago.
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NATO "woefully under-funded" says US
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Sept 22/05 -- The United States stepped up its calls on Thursday for European NATO allies to boost their defense spending, saying the alliance needed more funds to safeguard its commitments in Afghanistan and elsewhere.
U.S. ambassador to NATO Victoria Nuland said NATO was "woefully under-funded" and renewed the
U.S. complaint that many European countries still fell short of pledges to devote two percent of their gross domestic product to defense spending.
"Funding is a real problem," Nuland told a think-tank in Brussels.
"The good news is that we have a real and growing ambition to handle security in one of the most dangerous places in the world -- Afghanistan. But are we prepared to match that level of ambition with what it takes?"
NATO is preparing an expansion of its 10,000-strong ISAF peacekeeping force in Afghanistan next year from existing positions in the north and west to the south. Earlier expansion moves have been held up by shortages of troops and equipment.
The United States is leading efforts to reform NATO funding, which at present is based on the principle that missions are largely funded by whichever nations choose to take part.
Washington and others want to create greater pools of common funding to finance missions regardless of who contributes troops. That is seen allowing the alliance to react faster and encouraging smaller nations to come forward to take part.
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Poland's Conservative Party "Law and Justice" Wins Election
Sept 27/05
WARSAW, Poland - Poland's socially conservative Law and Justice party held its lead over the market-oriented Civic Platform to win the country's parliamentary election, according to a final results Tuesday.
With all ballots counted, Law and Justice took 27 percent of the vote, while Civic Platform had 24 percent, the State Electoral Commission said.
The ousted governing Democratic Left Alliance garnered only 11 percent, down from 41 percent in the last election four years ago. The party has been undermined by corruption scandals and persistently high unemployment.
Details of the distribution of seats in the lower and upper houses were expected later Tuesday.
Law and Justice planned to open talks with Civic Platform on forming a coalition government.
Law and Justice leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski noted Monday that the two center-right parties have a lot in common, including calls for tax cuts.
But he said his party would hold out against the centerpiece of Civic Platform's program — a
15 percent flat-rate tax for individuals, businesses and on consumption.
Law and Justice favors retaining higher tax rates for the wealthy and offering tax breaks for large families.
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Germany's new Left MPs accused of collaborating with Communist Stasi Secret
Police
Luke Harding in Berlin
Saturday September 24, 2005
The Guardian
The Guardian - Sept 24/05 - Germany's new Left party, which could play a crucial role in deciding the next chancellor, faced acute embarrassment yesterday amid claims that
at least seven of its MPs had collaborated with the
Stasi, the East German secret police.
The head of Germany's state-held Stasi archive, Marianne Birthler, said she had documents to prove the MPs had worked as
"inoffizielle mitarbeiter" (unofficial collaborators). The public had a right to know which MPs had collaborated, she said, adding: "It's a question of trust."
Tuesday, August 30, 2005
GREEN POLITICIAN AT ODDS WITH HER PARTY OVER ABORTION
Katrin Goering-Eckardt: “For Me as a Christian, Abortion is Out of the
Question”
By Wolfgang Polzer
Special to ASSIST News Service
BERLIN (ANS) -- A leading representative of the Greens in
the German Parliament is at odds with her own party over the abortion issue.
Katrin Goering-Eckardt, speaker of the Green deputies in the Bundestag, cannot
endorse the pro-choice stance in the party’s election platform.
As Germany is heading for general elections on September 18, the 39-year-old
Protestant politician told a German weekly: “For me as a Christian, abortion
is out of the question”. She regards it as inconsistent that the Green party
wants to protect the embryo from stem cell research, but not from abortion.
Katrin Goering-Eckardt, mother of two sons, is also a member of the General
Synod of the Protestant Churches in Germany. She was brought up in East Germany
under Communist rule. Her first encounters with the Christian faith came in her
youth, when she joined an evangelical fellowship. Later she studied Protestant
theology.
Europe Religious Apathy May Challenge Pope
Wed Apr 20/05 - Europe -
VATICAN CITY - AP - Pope Benedict XVI's first challenge is at his doorstep: a Europe of empty churches and religious apathy that has spurned Vatican attempts for it to recognize the continent's Christian heritage
"He's quite worried about Germany, I know, his own country," American Cardinal Avery Dulles said Wednesday in listing the concerns of the new pope. "But the whole of (the) Western European situation is dismal from his point of view."
"I think he will see the need for a new evangelization," said the 86-year-old Dulles, who was too old to participate in the conclave that chose Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger as pope.
Ratzinger's choice of Benedict as his papal name may be an indication of how he intends to point his pontificate.
St. Benedict of Nursia, a monk during the 5th and 6th centuries, just after the fall of the Roman Empire, drew up the rules for monastic life. The Benedictine order that followed his teachings became the main guardian of learning and literature in Western Europe during the dark centuries that followed. In the 1960s, Pope Paul VI named Benedict patron saint of Europe.
John Paul made many European pilgrimages, drawing huge crowds in countries such as Spain and
France but failing to draw Catholics back into churches or halting a decline in the number of new priests. Even in Italy, the home of the Vatican where Catholic traditions still run deep, a church-backed referendum failed to overturn a liberal abortion law during John Paul's papacy.
"Nobody is better informed than Pope Benedict on the European scene and the secularism of Europe and what might be the way in which the church lives with secularism," British Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor said Wednesday.
"I think all of us who are European bishops, European cardinals, are concerned about this question," he said.
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E.U. defies Bush on China arms
Joshua Moscrop, 13, was one of eight youngsters excluded from Woodham Community College in Newton Aycliffe.
The college said they had broken a ban which was put in place following a previous facial injury.
"I understand schools have rules, but surely a detention would have been enough," Joshua's mother, Kate, of Newton Aycliffe, said.
'Good parents'
"It wasn't done in a malicious way, it was just him and a few of his friends larking around.
"They have effectively given him permission to play in the snow for three days because I can't punish him for throwing a snowball - not when he and his dad were down in the field the night before the incident having fun doing the same.
"Kids don't see snow very often and they are bound to be a bit hyper, so there's nothing I can say. I think it's ridiculous."
Large Islamic Presence in Holland Concerns Journalist
By Chad Groening
(AgapePress) - February 16, 2005 - The editor of a Dutch Christian newspaper says he is very anxious about the rising influence of Islam in his country and in Western Europe as a whole.
Wim Kranendonk is editor of the Reformatorisch Dagblad (Reformed Daily), which is read by about 60,000 Dutch families. The veteran journalist says the concern about the influx of Muslims started in the 1970s when his country was prosperous and needed to hire cheap labor from North Africa. Then things changed, he explains.
"At the end of the 1970s, the economic situation was bad, and there was not so much work," Kranendonk recalls. Normal citizens and many elected officials, he says, then requested that the government curtail the immigration of Muslims, to no avail. "They didn't stop it," he says, "because of the left organizations in our society."
And because of the high birth rate among Muslim families in the Netherlands, coupled with the immigration rate, he says there are now Dutch towns populated entirely by Muslims. "These people have a high rate of births, so they have big families," he observes. "And then you see in towns where there are only people from abroad. Now we have [about] 600,000 Islamic people in the Netherlands."
According to the newspaper editor, the growing Islamic influence has led to the intolerance of critics, including the brutal murder of Dutch filmmaker Theo Van Gogh last fall.
"I was not a friend of Theo Van Gogh. He was cursing the Lord," Kranendonk says. "But it is an example of how Muslim people don't accept the freedom in the society."
Consequently, he says he is concerned about what the future holds for Holland and the rest of Western Europe. "I am anxious about what [the situation with the Muslim population] will be after another ten or fifteen years," he says.
Europeans 'ignorant' of EU treaty
Nine out of 10 European Union citizens know little or nothing about the new EU constitution, a study suggests.
But half of the 25,000 people polled by the EU said they would vote in favour of the treaty, which faces referendums in 10 of 25 member states.
The UK was the only country where more of those questioned were against the constitution than in favour.
More than a third of respondents remain undecided, with doubt highest in states planning to hold a referendum.
The EU-wide poll, conducted by Eurobarometer in October last year, found that only 11% felt they knew the content of the European Constitution "globally".
Some 56% said they knew a little, while 33% had never heard of the constitution.
'Connect with citizens'
Despite their apparent ignorance, 49% said they would vote in favour with only 16% firmly against - mainly because they feared a loss of national sovereignty, the survey indicated.
The new constitution, approved by the EU last month, faces a plebiscite in 10 countries, including the UK, Ireland, Portugal and Spain.
More than 33% of those questioned said they had yet to make up their minds on whether they supported the constitution, with hesitation particularly high in the 10 countries where a vote will be held.
U.S. Troops May Move Bases out of Western Europe
CASTEAU, Belgium - Jan 14/05 -U.S. troops could start moving from Cold War-era posts in Germany to new bases in Romania and Bulgaria this year as part of American efforts to create a more mobile overseas force, the top U.S. commander in Europe said Friday.
Marine Gen. James L. Jones said the United States was looking at up to five facilities in each country for use by Army, Air Force, Navy or Marine units.
"This is part and parcel of the transformation of our footprint in Europe, which has been in need of surgery for some time," he told reporters at NATO
military headquarters in southern Belgium after a trip to Romania and Bulgaria.
Plans for the bases are expected to be drawn up soon, and Jones said the move could start quickly if Congress and the two countries go along.
"There's no reason why we could not start with deployment this year," said the general, also NATO's top operational commander.
Cable Broadband to Lose Out Against Telcos -Survey
AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - Jan 20/05 - Europeans will get their broadband Internet connections mainly through upgraded phone networks by 2010, while cable television operators will see their market share decline to 15 percent, according to a survey.
Cable companies were the first to offer fast Internet connections to consumers in the late 1990s before telephone operators were capable of supercharging their copper telephone wires with DSL technology, but weak finances and reputations will hurt their prospects, Forrester research said on Thursday.
"Cash shortages will kill cable's momentum, and its market share will drop from 53 percent in 2000 to 15 percent in 2010," said market analyst Lars
Godell.
U.S. to Post Permanent Envoy to EU
BRUSSELS, Belgium - Jan 13/05 - The United States will station a top envoy in Brussels on a permanent basis to work with European Union
officials in the fight against terrorism, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge said Thursday.
Ridge, who is on his last trip to EU headquarters before stepping down from his Cabinet post, , said the envoy will be in place at the U.S. mission to the European Union by April 1.
"The United States shares an important partnership with the European Union," Ridge said during a speech at a European think-tank.
Ridge's remarks were seen as part of warming relations ahead of a Feb. 22 visit to EU headquarters by President Bush (news - web sites). After a stretch of trans-Atlantic tensions, Bush has sought a more conciliatory stance with the EU since his re-election.
EU leaders sign new constitution
European Union leaders have signed the new EU constitution in a lavish ceremony held in Rome.
Heads of state and government took it in turn to sign the text in the same room where the Treaty of Rome was signed to establish the EU in 1957.
The ceremony came amid a row about the views of prospective Italian EU commissioner Rocco Buttiglione.
Incoming Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso has withdrawn his entire team and is now considering changes.
"We need more time so I can go back to some of the prime ministers, so that I can get better choices... I'm sure I can get a better team," he told reporters in Rome on Friday.
Outgoing President Romano Prodi revealed after the ceremony that Mr Barroso plans to re-nominate a team of commissioners in time for a meeting on 17 November, the Reuters news agency reported.
"We are trying. There are some things to sort out," Mr Prodi was reported as saying.
Support for Barroso
EU leaders voiced their backing for Mr Barroso "to form a Commission that can count on widespread support," Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende said. His country currently holds the EU presidency.
Mediterranean also at risk of tsunamis, experts warn
ATHENS (AFP) - Dec 28/04 - Greece's popular tourist island of Rhodes could one day succumb to a similar fate as the Thai resort of Phuket, Greek seismologists warn, noting that the Mediterranean has been hit by tidal waves in the past.
Greece is particularly vulnerable with 50 percent of Europe's seismic activity concentrated in the country, and experts underscore the lack of a Mediterranean early warning system.
Southern Italy and Sicily, as well as the Algerian and Tunisian coastlines, are also high on the risk list, Gerassimos Papadopoulos, of the geodynamic institute of the Athens Observatory told AFP.
"There have been and there will be tsunamis in the Mediterranean, even if here this phenomenon is rarer and less violent than in the oceans in view of the more reduced magnitude of earthquakes which do not surpass 8-8.2 on the Richter scale," he told AFP.
The last big tidal wave recorded in Greece dates back to July 9, 1956 when an earthquake measuring 7.7 threw up a wall of water 25 metres (75 feet) high on to the Cycladic island of Amorgos, even affecting Egypt, local seismologist Vassilis Papazahos said.
In 1908, a tidal wave in the Strait of Messina unleashed by an earthquake, as happened on Sunday in the Indian Ocean, left more than a thousand people dead in Sicily and Calabria, he added.
"In 1956, there were just four deaths but today with the touristic development of the coasts the toll would be heavier and Rhodes for example could become a Greek Phuket," Papadopoulos said, referring to the popular Thai destination devastated by the tsunami that hit 10 countries mostly in Asia leaving more than 55,000 people dead.
He led a two-year research effort which has just completed a study on the risks facing Rhodes.
Muslims in Europe
SPEAKING FREELY
Aug 04 - (ATIMES) - A population of about 20 million Muslims has, over the past decade, made Islam the second-largest religion in Europe. It is important to recognize that there are not one but many Muslim communities in Europe. In Britain, which has about 1.6 million Muslims, Pakistani Muslims are the largest group, followed by Bangladeshis. In Germany and the Netherlands, Turkish Muslims predominate.
The Netherlands also has a considerable number of Moroccan and Surinamese Muslims. In France there are about 4.5 million Muslims and, as in Spain and Belgium, most of them are from Maghreb (mainly Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria), with small Turkish and African minorities. Over the past three decades, Islam has become increasingly visible in European public space. Mosques, halal food, Muslim customs and ways of dress are all increasingly common in European countries.
Although it is very difficult to get accurate estimates of the actual number of Muslims in Europe, this is simply because not only do the estimates of legal immigrants vary, but there is also little information on the number of illegal immigrants in Europe. There are concerns of population growth among second and third generation Muslim migrants and the impact of this on the demographics of Europe. According to certain estimates, Muslims are expected to outnumber non-Muslims in Europe by 2050.
EU transport ministers okay Galileo satellite tracking system
BRUSSELS (AFP) - EU - Dec 10/04 - transport ministers gave final approval to build and deploy the Galileo satellite navigation system with the aim of starting operations in 2008, the European Commission (news - web sites) announced.
The satellite network will complement the US Global Position System, which was originally developed for military targeting and position finding. The European system was the first to be designed for purely civilian use.
The United States and the EU signed an agreement in Ireland June 26 to adopt common operating standards for the two systems.
Friday's decision was to build and launch satellites and build ground receiving stations following a three-year design and development phase, costing 1.1 billion euros (1.45 billion dollars).
Deploying the Galileo system will cost a further 2.1 billion euros (2.76 billion dollars), with industry putting up two thirds of the investment and the commission one third.
The commission says the globe-girdling satellites will enable the development of new services in areas such as transport, the environment, agriculture and fisheries that are eventually expected to cover the running costs of the system, estimated at 220 million euros (290 million dollars).
Two consortia are fighting to obtain the contract to operate the system, and ministers were expected to decide on the winner by February next year. The Eurely alliance includes Alcatel, Finmeccanica and Vinci, while the iNavsat consortium comprises Thales, EADS and Inmarsat.
Oct 23/04
BRUSSELS, Belgium - The 25-member European Union — now comprising eight ex-communist nations and considering membership for Muslim-dominated Turkey — is busily crafting a "Wider Europe" as well.
It would stretch far beyond the EU's formal borders and aim to lock nearby lands into democracy and good neighborly relations through tailor-made programs of trade and assistance.
But the blueprint for a "ring of friends" making Europe's neighborhood safe, secure and prosperous comes with complications: There is Israel and its nuclear ambiguity and security morass. Russia, Ukraine and Belarus show creeping authoritarianism. Libya may be emerging from the cold, but it is still a dictatorship. The Balkans remain a scary doorstep.
In many ways, however, this may be the very point.
The EU's outreach program to sometimes dangerous places beyond its borders marks a dramatic shift in Europe's perception of how it can play a key — perhaps central — role in world affairs: The strategy is one of exploiting economic clout to both achieve influence on the world stage and shape the rim of Europe. Perhaps Europe might even school America — and its many Euro-cynics — in the merits of persuasion rather than force.
"We want to strengthen the instruments available to us to become a dynamic protagonist in the world. The EU has a leading role to play in securing human rights and democracy," said Austrian Foreign Minister Benita Ferrero-Waldner, who is set to take over as the EU external relations commissioner on Nov. 1.
If the United States has in the post-Sept. 11 era become more willing to use its overwhelming military might as a stick to bring nations into line, the EU appears to be awakening to the possibility that the lure of "Old World" good life can be a comparably persuasive carrot in provoking change in areas of chaos and repression.
To see that go-softly approach in action, consider Turkey.
A decade ago, the notion that outside interference might succeed in persuading Turkey to implement meaningful democratic reforms, dismantle a system of judicial repression based largely on torture, curb the power of a military that had dominated society for decades, and loosen state control over the economy would have seemed remote.
But those objectives have largely become a reality. And the reason, of course, is the strict conditions — based on human rights as well as fiscal soundness — that Europe imposed on Turkey to win even a prospect of EU membership.
In economic terms at least, Europe is a genuine superpower.
The EU's enlargement last May added 75 million consumers, creating a single market of 450 million people, compared to 420 million for NAFTA — the countries of the North American Free Trade Agreement.
Its total GDP (news - web sites) — well over $11 trillion in 2003 — outstrips, by today's exchange rate, that of the United States.
It is already the world's biggest trader, home to one of the world's most sought-after currencies and — defined as a single unit — is
the world's biggest donor, spending more than $600 million a month in assistance projects on all five continents.
Jail sentence for sexist insults under new (European) law
Thursday June 24, 2004
The cabinet yesterday gave its backing to a bill authorising penalties of up to a year in jail for anyone found guilty of making an anti-gay or sexist remark.
NEW EU/EC PRESIDENT
Mr Barroso, 48, will take over from Romano Prodi who is stepping down in October at the end of his five-year term.
Mr Barroso emerged after a stalemate over other candidates for the job, including former Tory party chairman Chris Patten and the federalist Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt.
Key EU parliament group backs Patten for top EU job
BRUSSELS (AFP) -(Jun 17/04) The biggest party in the European Parliament proposed EU external affairs commissioner Chris Patten for the key post of European Commission president, a key party official said.
"The candidate is Patten. He is a candidate with a pro-European standing," said Antonio Lopez Isturiz, secretary general of the conservative European People's Party (EPP), which remained the biggest group in the EU assembly in polls last week.In principle the successful candidate to succeed Commission head Romano Prodi needs the support of the EPP, because his nomination must be approved by the Parliament.
02.10.2002
Until now it has been impossible to read the Nice Treaty because
the Treaty only consists of a lot of detached amendments to the existing
treaties. A new book, the first published by the EUobserver.com now makes it
possible to read the amendments together with the existing treaties so it is
possible to judge the proposed amendments.
The book is available electronically and can be downloaded for private use by
clicking the link below. Hardcopies can be bought via the EUbookshop.com and a
CD-ROM is also available.
The Nice Treaty history
The Treaty of Nice was finally adopted on 26 February after five days of
negotiation at a summit in Nice in December 2000. It will not enter into force
until it has been approved by all 15 EU Member States, the so-called
ratification process.
The Treaty of Nice consists of additions and changes to the existing treaties
meaning it can only be truly understood when it is compared with existing
treaties.
The official consolidated version has not yet been published. Thus, this
consolidation is based on the Councils version 2001/C 80/01 of the Treaty of
Nice, the Treaty on European Union (TEU) and the Treaty establishing the
European Community (TEC).
The Treaty is difficult to understand, even for experts.
The following tools make it easier to understand:
- All additions to the existing treaties are written in bold. If the Treaty of
Nice is ratified, existing law will be all the articles printed with ordinary
letters plus everything written in bold.
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EU eyes deal on first-ever constitution at crunch summit
BRUSSELS (AFP)(Jun 17/04) - European Union leaders appeared confident of sealing a deal on a long-disputed constitution at a Brussels summit, but were struggling to agree on the top executive job in the just-expanded bloc.
Officials were upbeat about the crunch negotiations after an opening session, but continued haggling on the first-ever EU constitution promised a fight to the finish as the 25-nation grouping battles to finalize the treaty."We're closing in on the agreement," Irish Prime Minister and EU presidency holder Bertie Ahern told reporters after a first session at the two-day summit.
Differences remained, he said, but added: "I don't think they are unbridgeable."
An optimistic German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer had a similar metaphor. "It's like building a bridge. The last stone has to be placed," he said of the complex negotiations on a constitution aimed at preventing decision-making paralysis as the Union grows.
"I assume that we'll be finished on schedule," he added.
The last constitutional summit in December collapsed in acrimony amid bitter battles over voting rights in the EU, which enlarged to include 10 new member countries on May Day.
New European Union
beckons India
KOLKATA - May 11/04 - Given that India's image in Europe is changing towards
that of a dynamic trailblazer with a knowledge-based economy - sentiments echoed
by European Commission President Romano Prodi - the May 1 landmark development
of 10 new countries joining the ranks of the 15-member European Union (EU),
according to experts, gives India one of the most important opportunities of the
21st century to develop an alternative base for prosperity and cooperation, and
to enter into new relationships.
BEIJING, May 1 (Xinhuanet) -- Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao will head
to Europe for a trip set to focus on expanding trade and strategic partnerships.
The 10-day visit will begin on Sunday.
The premier will visit Germany, Italy, Britain, Ireland and Belgium, where he will also meet European Union leaders.
The 10-day visit, which begins on Sunday, will be the premier's first trip to Europe since he took office last year. He is also expected to press for a European Union arms embargo to be lifted. China says its relations with the EU are at an all-time high - a claim backed by the EU ambassador to China, Klaus Ebermann.
China overtook Japan in 2003 to become the EU's second largest trading partner, while the EU is China's third largest.
E.U. enlargement
Apr 16th 2004
After years of negotiations, ten new countries were invited in December 2002 to join the European Union in May 2004: Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Slovakia, Malta, Cyprus, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Romania and Bulgaria could follow a few years later. Turkey wants to join too, but the EU—concerned among other things about Turkey's human-rights record—has promised only a review of Turkey's application in 2004. A few other countries, like Croatia, may also join the queue.
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Ever-expanding Union?
The Largest Change in Europe since World War II
There
are worries that a European Union of 25 member countries will prove
unmanageable. But the queue to join continues growing. Could the Union one day
expand to take in the whole of continental Europe and beyond?
E.U. Moves Eastward: Fireworks and flags as new Europe fetes enlargement
May 1: the European Union is admitting 10 new members
E.U. set to impose a further 5% customs duty on U.S. Goods.
Percentage to
grow each Month
EU
turns to India's arms market
Full-text of EU-US agreement on the transfer of personal data
"International Court of Justice" (ICJ) Expected to Rule It's Illegal for Israel to Protect Itself
(AgapePress) - An Israeli author and Middle East expert says he doesn't expect the U.N. International Court of Justice to rule in his country's favor on the question of whether the Israeli security fence is "legal."
Testimony has wrapped up in The Hague, Netherlands, with the Arab League claiming the Israeli defense barrier is a violation of international law. One Palestinian delegation leader said the construction of the wall was an illegal occupation of Palestinian land, denied Palestinians their rights, and destroyed the chance of peace. (See Earlier Related Article)
Israel, which says the ICC has no jurisdiction, boycotted the three days of testimony because the hearing failed to address the issue of Palestinian terrorism. But the Israeli Foreign Ministry did send one piece of evidence: the mangled wreckage of a vehicle blown up by a homicide bomber. That display was the centerpiece of a pro-Israel demonstration on Monday.
Israeli
Official Says Arab-Muslim Bloc Holds U.N. Controls
CHRISTIANITY, A DECISIVE FACTOR IN EUROPE’S FORMATION
CHRISTIANITY, A DECISIVE FACTOR IN EUROPE’S FORMATION VATICAN CITY,
FEB 14, 2004 (VIS)(Vatican Information Service) – A group of pilgrims from Slovakia, accompanied by Cardinals Jan Korec and Jozef Tomko and by President Rudolf Schuster, was welcomed to the Vatican today by John Paul II who recalled the three times he visited their country: in 1990 after the fall of the communist regime, in 1995 and again in 2003.
Noting that their visit coincides with the feast today of Cyril and Methodius, the Slav brothers and saints who are patrons of Slovakia and co-patrons of Europe, the Pope said that “the witness of these two great apostles of the Slavs is a strong reminder to rediscover the roots of the European identity of your people, roots that you share with other nations on the continent.” Your faith, he told the Slovak pilgrims, represents the richest and most solid patrimony of your people. Safeguard and nourish it, he said: “It must not be hidden, but proclaimed and witness to with courage.”
The Holy Father [the Pope] pointed out that Jesus taught the disciples to be “’the salt of the earth, …and the light of the world’. Being ‘salt’ and ‘light’ means making the Gospel truth shine in your daily personal and community choices. It means keeping unchanged the spiritual legacy of Saints Cyril and Methodius by opposing the widespread tendency to conform to homologous and standardized models. “Slovakia and Europe of the Third Millennium,” he underscored, “have become enriched by many cultural contributions but it would be deleterious to forget that Christianity contributed in a decisive manner to the formation of the continent. You, dear Slovaks, offer your significant contribution to the hoped-for building of European unity, making yourselves the voice of those human and spiritual values which have given meaning to your history. It is indispensable for these ideals that you have lived with coherence to continue to guide a free Europe that offers solidarity, capable of harmonizing its diverse cultural and religious traditions.”
China and the E.U.
End Time PowerBlocks - Re-alignments coming ?
China courts friends in Europe
http://www.janes.com/security/international_security/news/jir/jir040113_1_n.shtml
VOA News
- E.U. Set to Expand
This coming May (2004), the map of Europe will change radically as the European Union expands eastward into former communist lands and the Mediterranean. The move will extend a zone of prosperity, and heal the Cold War divide. But as the union incorporates 10 new countries, it will also create new borders, and people living further east fear being stuck behind a new bureaucratic Iron Curtain.
European unity may still be a concept more of hope than of reality. But the freedom to wander around the continent is arguably the single most important change in European life in the last 50 years. It is this ability to travel freely that most distinguishes young Europeans' lives from those of their parents.
Most citizens of the European Union can now travel from country to country, without ever having to go through immigration controls or customs booths. And that privilege will soon be extended to the citizens of the bloc's new members.
Analyst Heather Grabbe of London's Center for European Reform says most citizens of the central and eastern European countries that will join the EU next year can already travel around the EU without a visa.
"What has not been removed are the actual border checks between the new member states and the old member states," she said. "So basically, you have to take your passport with you, and you have to wait in line at the border to have your passport and your car checked, before you're allowed to cross, for example, from Slovakia into Austria, or from Slovenia into Italy, or from the Czech Republic into Poland, and vice-versa, whereas you can travel from Germany into France and from Italy into Austria, without having any checks done at all."
Ms. Grabbe says citizens of the EU newcomer states will not be able to enjoy passport-free travel, like their western counterparts, before 2006 at the earliest. That is because their countries still have to meet the EU's criteria on border controls.
Still, EU enlargement has already meant and will continue to mean an extension of stability and economic growth to the new members.
Professor Jerome Sheridan, who heads the American University's Brussels Center, argues that the EU's eastward expansion acts as an incentive for countries further east or south to undertake the internal reforms they need to eventually join the union themselves.
"What happens as the EU enlarges is [that] other countries see this, and they want to be a part of it," said Professor Sheridan. "The greatest example of this that I can think of is, what is going on in Croatia and Serbia right now. … They chose to go back to the old ways of settling conflicts in Europe, that is, through war, while everybody else chose the path of joining the European Union. ... And the Croats and the Serbs have seen this, and now they're desperately trying to play catch-up, to become part of the club, as well."
As the EU's borders expand eastward, some countries gain and others lose out.
Poland has done its utmost to reach out to its eastern neighbor, Ukraine, and has privately advocated that the door to EU membership be kept open, until it is ready to join.
But Poland, as a newcomer to the EU, was obliged last month to impose visas on citizens of Ukraine, many of whom have relied on easy access to their more prosperous neighbor since the Soviet Union fell apart. As analyst Heather Grabbe points out, that is having a direct impact on people-to-people contacts across the borders.
"A lot of people just over the EU's new border depend on, trade with, and work in the new member states," said Ms. Grabbe. "There are several million people in western Ukraine whose livelihoods depend on that. And they are now cut off. It's much harder for them to cross the border. They have to go to towns, which may be a long way away to get a visa, and so on."
Economists say the new red-tape curtain will hurt struggling border-zone economies, by making it more difficult for small traders to peddle their wares across the frontier. Small-scale trade in everything from foodstuffs to appliances to gasoline along Poland's eastern borders is now worth $700 million a year. Since the imposition of the new controls, cross-border traffic has dropped considerably.
Poland's accession to the EU means that it and other newcomers will have to assume responsibility for sealing the bloc's still porous outer borders against smugglers of weapons, drugs and people. Officials in Slovakia and Slovenia say the flow into their countries of mainly Asian illegal immigrants has increased, as the date for their joining the EU approaches. Most of the illegal immigrants hope to reach more prosperous western European nations.
The EU and individual countries like Germany are providing money, equipment and technical know-how to help the newcomers upgrade their border controls. Poland, which has the longest eastern frontier, is required to have a border post every 25 kilometers - a total of 232 crossing points.
EU officials say there is no question of constructing a new Berlin Wall or an Israel-West Bank barrier along the bloc's eastern frontiers. Matthew Kirk, Britain's ambassador to Finland, says the borders should be tight, but also user-friendly.
"The challenge at the frontiers is constantly changing, and the criminals, the terrorists, the proliferators, the people-smugglers are constantly finding new ways through," he said. "The real difficulty of running a frontier is to stop the bad things from happening while, at the same time, allowing the goods and the people who need to cross the frontier to do so, as quickly and as easily as possible."
The European Commission, which runs the EU's day-to-day affairs, has proposed creating a border control agency to coordinate policies among the soon-to-be 25 member nations. But national governments are wary of relinquishing their control over immigration policy, because it is a hotly contested domestic issue in most countries.
[VOA News- Originally posted Nov 03 - Good News is never out of date]
January 2004
EU
to Expand under Irish 'Welcome'
By Victoria Ward, PA News
The EU Presidency offers a unique opportunity to boost Irish standing abroad.
One of the Irish Government’s key priorities is to oversee the enlargement of
the EU on May 1 – which ministers predict will characterise the presidency.
Ten countries will officially be sworn into the Union, its
largest single expansion taking it from 15 to 25 full member states.
Dubbed the “day of welcomes” the enlargement will be marked by a ceremony in
Dublin as well as celebrations across the Republic.
Heads of state from all 24 member states have been invited to Dublin for the
ceremony as well as Romania and Bulgaria who are hoping to join in 2007.
Developing a stable network for the 10 new countries will form a crucial
part of the coming Presidency.
Another aim for the Irish Government is to advance negotiations on a new
constitution for the enlarged Union.
Although EU leaders failed to agree new terms during the Italian Presidency,
Irish Foreign Minister Brian Cowen has said he will move to conclude
negotiations “if the atmosphere is right.”
The advancement of the EU’s Lisbon competitiveness strategy which aims to
transform the EU into the world’s leading knowledge-based economy by 2010 will
also be a priority over the next six months.
The strategy has already brought benefits to EU citizens in terms of cheaper air
travel, cheaper gas and electricity and more jobs, said Mr Cowen.
The Spring Council, which will take place on March 25-26, will provide an
opportunity to raise subjects such as employment levels, living standards and
greater social protection.
Irish premier Bertie Ahern has stressed that momentum on these issues needs to
be stepped up and Ireland intends to focus on areas where improvements will
result in further benefits for Europe’s workers, business people and
consumers.
Reports suggest that the Irish Government is also planning a significant move to
reduce restrictive practices in key professions such as lawyers, doctors,
dentists and architects.
Such reforms would include abolishing restrictions on advertising and a
one-stop-shop accreditation system, allowing companies to operate in all EU
states.
Promoting economic growth, innovation and employment, fighting crime, forging
common policies on asylum and immigration as well as developing an EU foreign
policy based on stronger ties with the United Nations. will all be priorities
during the Irish Presidency.
The Taoiseach is set to lead the European delegation at five summits.
In particular, a planned EU-US Summit is being highlighted as a key means of
promoting better transatlantic relations.
The potential June meeting, which has already attracted widespread criticism,
may involve a visit by President George W Bush to Dublin.
Mr Ahern will co-chair the EU-Latin America and Caribbean
Summit with President Vicente Fox of Mexico, which will take place next
May in Mexico.
He will lead the EU side at the EU-Russia Summit in Moscow, the EU-Japan Summit
in Tokyo and the EU-Canada Summit, which will probably be in Dublin.
Separate EU Ministerial meetings with Mediterranean and Asian foreign ministers
are planned and are expected to take place in Dublin.
There will be a total of more than 100 meetings in Ireland, many of which will
take place outside Dublin.
Counties hosting events and meetings include Dublin, Kerry, Waterford, Offaly,
Wicklow, Kildare, Galway, and Cork.
Irish businesses are sponsoring products used during proceedings over the next
six months including bottled water and gift items.
These companies will also be entitled to use the official presidency logo on
their merchandise and marketing.
The Government is planning to make progress in the area of occupational health
and safety and on the reform of Europe’s national pension systems.
Ireland first held the presidency in 1975, and the forthcoming 2004 Presidency
will be its sixth.
There will be an EU flag-raising ceremony at Dublin Castle tomorrow and the
programme will be launched with a meeting between the Government and the
Commission at the Castle on January 6.
source at: http://www.news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2361034
Is Europe Lost?
A
Traumatic Experience at the Council of Europe
German
Exit Polls Indicate Big Win for Conservatives in Bavaria
VOA News
- 21 Sep
2003
According to exit polls, Bavaria Governor Edmund Stoiber's Christian Social Union snared nearly 62 percent of the vote Sunday. The Social Democratic Party was left with only 19 percent, their worst showing in post-war Bavaria.
Political analysts have been predicting a solid win for Stoiber's party in the conservative, prosperous state where Social Democrats have not governed for 46 years.
But the victory is also seen as a reflection of wider German discontent with Mr. Schroeder's party, which many Germans blame for failing to reverse an economic downturn and rising unemployment.
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U.S. will help E.U. (Europe) launch its own GPS/Tracking system
More info. about the Galileo EU GPS/Tracking System
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galileo_positioning_system
http://europa.eu.int/comm/mediatheque/video/index_en.html
Fake Diamonds, Real Competition for DeBeers
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/11.09/diamond.html
Pentagon to try to Spy on all of Us ?
Are electoral voting machines programed accurately ?
U.S./E.U. Conflicts concerning Galileo/GPS System
http://www.spacedaily.com/news/gps-euro-01g.html
European Cash to have embeded Spying Chip
http://www.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,59565,00.html
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THERE IS NOT ONE CHRISTIAN NATION ON EARTH WHERE MUSLIMS ARE PERSECUTED.
Yet in most nations where the majority of the population are Muslims, there is systematic government persecution of Christians.
"Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance."
--Article 18 of the Universal
Declaration of
Human
Rights--
Christian Conversions - According to the Bible - Can NEVER be forced.
Any Conversion to Christianity which would be "Forced" would NOT be recognized by God. It is in
His True and KIND nature, that those who come to Him and choose to believe in Him, must come to Him OF
THEIR OWN FREE WILL.
Don't Let anyone tell you that Christians support Forced Conversions.
That is False. True Christianity is NEVER forced.
Core Universal Rights
The right to believe, to worship and witness
The right to change one's belief or religion
The right to join together and express one's belief
