Browsing: featured-eu

Less than two months after losing his home in an arson attack, the mayor of a town in western France resigned this week, citing, among other things, a “lack of support from the state”. Amid an increasingly tense political environment, attacks against mayors in France are multiplying. And some say they have been left to fend for themselves.

Tourism in Italy has rebounded from COVID-19 lows but not everybody is happy to see the crowds of foreigners back.

Sweden won the Eurovision Song Contest early Sunday, as singer Loreen beat out 25 competitors in the finale of the world’s biggest live music event, hosted by Britain on behalf of war-torn Ukraine.

The Ukrainian city of Ternopil was attacked by Russia just before the country’s Eurovision act was set to take the stage.

Rattled by repeated cases of sexual abuse over the years, the French Catholic Church will soon provide digital ID cards with scannable QR codes that will offer colour-coded background information – ranging from green to orange to red – on bishops, priests and deacons. But the new measure is raising eyebrows.

Spain is running out of water. After a long and painful drought, the country has been hit by an unusually early heat wave, evaporating even more of the “blue gold” it still has left in its reservoirs. While farmers fear for their survival, environmentalists say it is time for “Europe’s back garden” to rethink how it uses and manages its increasingly scarce water supply.

Turkey is officially a candidate to join the EU but its accession talks have been frozen since 2018 over rule of law and democratic concerns.

An early scorching heatwave across Spain has worsened the impact of the country’s long-term drought, causing unprecedented damage to the country’s crops. As farmers grow desperate for irrigation, the government’s plan to limit the rerouting of water from the nation’s longest river – the Tagus – for agricultural purposes lies at the centre of a heated debate. FRANCE 24 reports.

In this edition of “Brussels, my love?”, we take a look at Germany’s role in Europe following Chancellor Scholz’s speech before the European Parliament and ask whether the belated ratification of the Istanbul Convention to fight violence against women was a relief – or an embarrassment.

After a long battle, Portugal on Friday passed a law legalising euthanasia for people in great suffering and with incurable diseases, joining just a handful of countries around the world.