Euobserver.com

The world is at "a turning point," Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky warned in Davos — urging Western countries to impose "maximum sanctions" on Russia.

A veteran Russian diplomat to the UN office at Geneva, Boris Bondarev, said he resigned and in a letter to colleagues criticised the "aggressive war unleashed" by president Vladimir Putin in Ukraine, AP reported. "For twenty years of my diplomatic career I have seen different turns of our foreign policy, but never have I been so ashamed of my country as on Feb. 24 of this year," he wrote.

Belgium will have to throw away more than 1.3 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines by July, the Belgian newspaper Le Soir reported on Monday. Belgium has 436,800 doses of AstraZeneca that will expire at the end of the month and another 880,000 doses of Moderna and BioNTech/Pfizer that will reach the expiration date in July. Additionally, there are 422,000 Novavax doses due to expire by the end of August.

Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden have reported 85 cases of monkeypox between 15 and 23 May. In a statement on Monday, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control said the disease could become endemic in Europe if the virus spreads from humans to animals. It also noted that the current cases have presented with mild disease symptoms and that the likelihood of spread is very low.

A Ukrainian court sentenced a 21-year old Russian soldier to life in prison Monday for killing a civilian in the first conviction for war crimes since Moscow's invasion of Ukraine. Sgt. Vadim Shishimarin pleaded guilty to shooting a 62-year old man in the head in the Sumy region, testifying he shot Oleksandr Shelipov after being ordered to do so, AP reported. Ukrainian prosecutors are investigating thousands of potential war crimes.

The European Commission on Monday proposed to extend suspension of fiscal borrowing rule in 2023 — but advised prudence amid already rising real interest rates.

Democratic Unionist MPs could affirm unequivocally they support the Good Friday Agreement, with no return of a border with physical controls on movement of people, goods or agricultural produce within the island of Ireland — but they won't.

The European Central Bank is "likely" on track to lift its main policy rate back to zero by the end of September, president Christine Lagarde wrote in a blog on Monday. Lagarde is facing pressure from some of its more hawkish governing council members, including the Dutch Klaas Knot, to exit its loose monetary policy to tackle inflation. However, she said gradual quarter-point rises were "a prudent strategy under uncertainty."

As the world continues to seek productive ways to provide assistance to the beleaguered citizens of Ukraine, the Hungarian government is now using the humanitarian crisis to further its own authoritarian ambitions.

German economy minister Robert Habeck has warned Hungary against blocking efforts to impose an EU-wide embargo on Russian oil imports in response to the war in Ukraine, Reuters reported. But the minister also added Germany would support the EU going ahead with the embargo without Hungary. "If the Commission president says we're doing this as 26 without Hungary, then that is a path that I would always support," Habeck said.

Some 630,000 weapons are listed as "wanted items" in EU police databases, amid growing worries over right-wing extremism.

Last-minute Israeli blacklistings and red lines have prompted MEPs to call off an official trip, posing the question if Israel can belittle the EU Parliament with impunity.

On World Bee Day, it is essential to pay homage to a variety of pollinating insects crucial for our food security. A number of EU projects contribute to their sustained survival.

Britain is likely to send just a few "hundreds" of asylum seekers to Rwanda for claims processing each year its justice secretary Dominic Rabb told the BBC Friday. "I'd be careful about managing expectations. It is not going to deal with the whole problem," but will send an "important message" to irregular migrants, he said. The first flights may take off in June, amid delays caused by civil-rights group appeals.

Friday's knife attacks in a village in Norway were carried out by a Syrian man but linked to a domestic dispute rather than religion or politics, Norwegian police say. "This is a family from Syria where the perpetrator is married to one of the victims," a police statement said, Reuters said. "There is no longer a danger to other people," a police spokesperson added.

On the 30th anniversary of the Falcone murder by the Sicilian mafia, Italy remembers how one of the EU's founding members almost became a Mediterranean narco-state.

Swedish foreign minister Ann Linde has complained of "vastly-spread disinformation" that Sweden harboured militants from the separatist PKK party in Turkey, saying Sweden "was first after Turkey to list PKK as a terrorist organisation, already in 1984". Ankara has threatened to block Sweden and Finland's Nato bid saying they hosted "terrorists". Russia said Friday it would create 12 new military units on its western flank over the Nordic Nato move.

Former German chancellor Gerhard Schröder and a German businessman, Matthias Warnig, who used to work in the Communist-era Stasi secret police, have quit their jobs in Russian oil firm Rosneft, amid a political outcry over Russia's war on Ukraine. They both still work for the Russian-owned Nord Stream 2 gas consortium. German chancellor Olaf Scholz on Thursday rejected an EU parliament appeal to blacklist Schröder for his close Russian ties.

The Group of Seven leading industrial nations has agreed to provide €18bn in aid for Ukraine at a meeting of G7 finance ministers in Bonn, the Financial Times reported. According to estimates, Ukraine will need €4.7bn a month to pay wages and keep government services running. US treasury secretary Janet Yellen this week called on EU allies to increase financial aid to help Ukraine "get through" the Russian invasion.

Italian transport unions on Friday striked in protest against military aid for Ukraine and called for an immediate ceasefire. While most Italians blame Russia's president Vladimir Putin for the conflict, union leaders want the government to increase workers' wages instead, and some fear that sending weapons will prolong the conflict. Within Italy's coalition government, Giuseppe Conte's 5 Star movement and Matteo Salvini's League oppose Italy's supply of weapons to Ukraine.