European Union

Angela Merkel and her Spanish counterpart Pedro Sánchez have agreed to collaborate more closely on the issue of migrants from North Africa. Morocco is to receive more money for border control measures while Spain will take back individual refugees heading for Germany. Can Berlin and Madrid give the starting signal for a new refugee policy with the deal?

A draft law put forward by the Hungarian government is set to ban universities in the country from offering courses in gender studies. The bill would affect the Central European University, financed by George Soros, as well as Eötvös Lóránd University in Budapest. While pro-government media are thrilled to see traditional values being protected, others condemn the initiative as cheap propaganda.

After ten years of negotiations the five states that border the Caspian Sea have agreed on a treaty governing the legal status of the body of water. Up to now only a deal agreed between the Soviet Union and Iran in the 1930s had applied. Commentators analyse Russia's position in settling the dispute.

While political relations are at a current low, EU-Israel ties are steadily growing in areas less known to the public. Raanan Eliaz and Dimitri Dombret explain how economic and commercial ties, as well as more human interaction, could help rescue the dire political ties.

Extreme heat and forest fires seem to have helped Sweden's Green Party, growing its support from four percent in June to 5.6 percent, according to the latest poll from SIFO institute, published by Svenska Dagbladet. The threshold in Sweden is four percent. With focus moving away from migration issues over the summer, the far-right Sweden Democrats lost support slightly, falling from 18.5 percent in June to 16.8 percent.

Leaders of the five Caspian littoral states met on Sunday (12 August) for the Fifth Caspian Summit in Kazakhstan's port city Aktau to sign a landmark declaration determining the legal status of the Caspian Sea and aiming to end the legal limbo over its resource-rich waters.

Human rights groups called on European governments on Sunday to tell a charity ship where it can dock and let more than 140 migrants rescued in the Mediterranean disembark in safety.

Thousands took part on Sunday (12 August) in the third night of protests in Bucharest against alleged government corruption, two days after a crackdown on a mass demonstration left hundreds injured.

German carmaker Daimler has shelved its expansion plans in Iran due to the reimposition of US sanctions but it might not be the last EU company to pull the plug on future aspirations, businesses organisations told EURACTIV.

Germany's economy minister on Sunday lashed out at US President Donald Trump, slamming his global trade rows and efforts to "dictate" Europe's dealings with Iran through renewed US sanctions.

France plans to introduce a penalty system next year that would increase the costs of consumer goods with packaging made of non-recycled plastic.

Monsanto's Roundup weedkiller was a substantial factor in causing cancer, a San Francisco jury has found, and ruled the company liable for a terminally ill man's cancer and awarding him €254m in damages. In Europe, more than 1.3 million people signed a 'Stop Glyphosate' petition, but authorisation for the world's best-selling herbicide was nevertheless extended for five years last November.

The Turkish lira dropped almost nine percent in early trading on Monday and the euro hit a one-year low as investors feared Turkey's financial crisis could spread into European markets. The lira has lost more than 40 percent of its value this year on worries over president Recep Tayyip Erdogan's economic management. Erdogan accused foreign countries of waging war on Turkey and said he would respond with trade measures.