Author: Olga Winter - EU Newsdesk

Olga Winter is a specialist editor writing about current affairs on the EU news desk for WTX News. Based in Brussels she ideally suited to the address the domestic and global affairs of the European continent, with assignments that include expose and In Review features for specialist reports..

No presidential election in 2025 in Ukraine despite being pushed by Trump. When will Ukraine hold a presidential election? It was postponed because of the war with Russia, but it is now almost three years since the start of the Russian invasion, and Volodymyr Zelenskyy is being asked about it more and more often. When will Ukraine hold a presidential election? He always gives the same response: “The hot phase of the war will end,…

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An American federal judge has ordered the Trump administration to suspend some 2,200 employees and eliminate the United States International Development Agency (USAID) on Friday to consider that it is a fraudulent agency. Two employee representatives had previously filed a lawsuit, arguing that Donald Trump’s government had no authority to suspend employees, as reported by US media such as ‘The New York Times’. The judge clarified that his ruling was provisional while the litigation continued.…

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What do USAID cutbacks mean for development aid. The decision by US President Donald Trump to suspend development aid has brought US-funded projects in around 130 countries to a standstill. This has had dramatic consequences for millions of people and humanitarian aid workers around the world. Trump has accused the development agency USAID of wastefulness. On February 6, he wrote on his “Truth Social” platform “Looks like billions of dollars have been stolen at USAID.” He…

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The Missing Alaska plane found, all 10 on board believed dead and all ten on board a passenger plane that went missing over Alaska are believed to be dead, the US Coast Guard said after locating the wreckage on sea ice about 34 miles southeast of Nome. The US Coast Guard initially reported that three bodies had been found inside the wreckage and then said the remaining seven were also believed to be inside the…

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The Official Gazette of Extremadura (DOE) has published this Friday, February 7, the Order of the Minister of Finance and Public Administration, Elena Manzano, which sets the conditions and criteria for applying the extension of the General Budgets of The Community of Extremadura for 2024 in the exercise of 2025. The order includes the regulatory framework in which the automatic extension of the budgets approved by law 1/2024, of February 5, of general budgets of…

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Israeli forces said late Thursday it had struck two sites that allegedly contained weapons belonging to the Hezbollah group, a Hamas ally, despite a separate ceasefire deal in that country. Israel’s forces “conducted a precise strike in Lebanese territory on two military sites that contained Hezbollah weapons, which were in violation of the ceasefire agreement,” the Israeli army said in a statement on social media platform X. Previously-sporadic fighting between Israel and Hezbollah escalated on 8 October…

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Authorities in Greece on Thursday moved to declare a state of emergency on the island of Santorini as persistent tremors continued hiking fears of a possible bigger earthquake. The region has been rattled by thousands of tremors and more than a hundred earthquakes since January 26. Emergency measures in effect until March 3 The Greek Civil Protection Ministry issued the declaration that allows authorities to quickly mobilize heavy equipment and emergency personnel. The ministry said the declaration would…

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South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa came out in defense of his country and said South Africa will not be bullied by Trump during a national address on Thursday, asserting that South Africa would not be bullied by the US administration and Elon Musk. Elon Musk is at odds with the South African government, primarily for domestic DEI issues but also because the are at odds over the Rwanda and DR Congo conflict. On the one…

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Is Ethiopia’s Tigray on the brink of a fresh conflict, is it ready to explode. Insecurity in Ethiopia’s northern Tigray region has noticeably increased in the last few days.  Many Tigrayans told WTX they are afraid that recent political tensions within the once-dominant Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) could lead to renewed violence — more than two years after one of Ethiopia’s deadliest conflicts claimed nearly 600,000 lives. Amid soaring prices, some Tigray locals have…

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The European Central Bank has a new reason to be optimistic. One of the last pieces that lack the ECB to be able to sing victory in its fight against inflation is to get salaries to moderate their growth in the euro zone, and these are already beginning to give encouraging signs for the Central Bank. The favorite ECB indicator to anticipate future movements in the salary front has given this week a great joy…

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The Aga Khan, imam of the Ismaili Muslims, has died “peacefully” at the age of 88 in Lisbon, his foundation announced on Tuesday. “His Highness Prince Karim Al-Hussaini, Aga Khan IV, 49th hereditary Imam of the Shia Ismaili Muslims and direct descendant of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him), passed away peacefully in Lisbon on 4 February 2025, aged 88, surrounded by his family,” the Aga Khan Foundation posted on social media. “The announcement of his…

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The recovery plan announced by the Generalitat Valenciana and that has not yet been reflected in any document will have as main actors the PWC consultant and the state company Tragsatec. Both will jointly receive 4.5 million for consulting and assistance to prepare the road map to face the day after the DANA and try to recover the levels prior to destruction. The Second Vice Presidency and Department for the economic and social recovery occupied…

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US President Donald Trump on Saturday said he ordered military airstrikes on a senior “Islamic State” attack planner and others from the terror network in Somalia. “These killers, who we found hiding in caves, threatened the United States and our Allies,” Trump said on Truth Social. “The strikes destroyed the caves they live in, and killed many terrorists without, in any way, harming civilians.” Strikes coordinated with Somalia’s government The strikes were carried out in the Golis…

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Beethoven or birds — but no room on new euro notes for Irish cultural icons The European Central Bank (ECB) is considering using European cultural figures on the front of its next series of euro banknotes but 14 of the 20 countries that use the currency, including Ireland, will not be represented. In an update on this long-running plan to update the euro banknotes, the ECB announced that it has selected motifs to illustrate the two possible…

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President Zelensky says Russia attacking own civilians in Kursk. As Ukraine accused Russia of bombing a boarding school sheltering civilians in the Russian town of Sudzha, which is currently occupied by Ukraine. At the same time, Russian officials said Kyiv was behind the air strike, which they described as a “crime.” “Russian aviation struck a boarding school in the town of Sudzha, Kursk region, with a guided aerial bomb,” the Ukrainian army’s general staff said…

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Donald Trump’s approach is clear: make immigration and asylum more difficult, deport undocumented immigrants, close the borders. He has already signed several executive orders to implement his plans. Executive orders allow a US president to take action without the approval of Congress. Though Trump seems to be making particularly extensive use of this tool, they are not uncommon as a means of taking urgent measures or concretizing existing laws. What do Trump’s executive orders mean…

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What is happening in the DR Congo now? The M23 rebel group was advancing towards another city in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) a UN expert said on Friday, just days after seizing the key eastern city of Goma, which is close to the Rwandan border. Large parts of the city are now under rebel control in what’s considered the worst escalation of a long-running conflict in more than a decade. The M23…

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The third sector of Social Action conducted 47 million interventions in 2023 and its action in economic terms, accounts for 1.44% of GDP-with economic revenues slightly above 19,000 million euros per year–, according to The Barometer of the Third Sector of Social Action (TSAS), presented by the Social Action NGO platform at the headquarters of the Eleven Foundation of Madrid. Among other data, the document reveals that the sector has more than 600,000 salaried people;…

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A small plane carrying 6 crashes in Philadelphia. It was a medical plane crashed shortly after takeoff in the US city of Philadelphia on Friday. Jet Rescue Air Ambulance, the company that operated the plane, said its aircraft was carrying six people. The plane crashed near shopping mall in a residential area. That included four crew members, one child medical patient and the patient’s mother on board. There is no confirmation that any survived, the…

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A total of 422 million euros. This is the figure that Aragon would stop receiving with the elimination of the criteria of depopulation and orography within the framework of autonomous financing. Of this amount, about 320.9 million euros would correspond to the orography, while 101.1 million euros would be for depopulation. They are the initial calculations that have been made in the Department of Finance after yesterday a document was received from the central government…

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Trump threatens BRICS with tariffs if they replace US dollar. The US President did not hold back and threatened BRICS member states with 100% tariffs on Thursday to dissuade them from replacing the US dollar as reserve currency. Donald Trump had made a similar statement right after winning the November 2024 elections. Trump threatens BRICS with tariffs “We are going to require a commitment from these seemingly hostile countries that they will neither create a…

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Germany offers maternity leave for women after miscarriage following a rigorous debate in parliament. The German Bundestag, the lower house of parliament, on Thursday evening passed a law that extends maternity leave protection to women who suffer a miscarriage after 13 weeks of pregnancy. Maternity leave for women after miscarriage A large majority of lawmakers voted in favor of the bill which aims to support women during a period of physical and emotional recovery, said Sarah…

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An explosion at arms munitions factory in Spain injures six people. They were injured after an explosion in ammunition department in factory in Spain on Thursday. Emergency services said one of them was in a serious condition. There was initial speculation that the plant was sabotaged by Russia, as the company are one of the biggest suppliers to Ukraine and Israel. But these were denied by site officials, who said an internal investigation is underway.…

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The Valencian Tax Agency (ATV), the Agency of the Generalitat Valenciana in charge of managing the collection of own taxes and assigned to the autonomous government, collected 2,541 million euros last year, 7.8% more despite fiscal sales applied after the change of regional executive in mid -2023. An annual balance that was presented by the Valencian President Carlos Mazón, who took advantage of these data from the first full year at the head of the…

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Swedish police on Thursday said five people had been arrested over the fatal shooting of an Iraqi man who carried out several Quran burnings. The man had been due to attend Stockholm District Court later in the day for the verdict in a case over “offenses of agitation against an ethnic or national group.” What we know so far The incident occurred indoors and when police arrived they found a man who had been “hit…

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