Euobserver.com

EU's trade commissioner Valdis Dombrovski's told the Financial Times he hoped Chile's incoming leftwing government and the EU will sign a trade deal that was originally negotiated by the country's rightwing predecessor. President-elect Gabriel Boric will take office in March and his government includes the Communist party. France has recently warned against the deal, fearing cheap chicken imports will hurt French farmers.

Turkey has offered to mediate between Bosnian opponents after Bosnian Serb leader Mirolad Dodik recently pushed ahead with plans to break up the country. "We view Bosnia and Herzegovina as a whole. We have done all we can for its unity and stability ... If desired, Turkey can work as a mediator in Bosnia," Turkish defence minister Hulusi Akar said Tuesday after visiting Sarajevo.

Polish prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki said Tuesday he hoped "to end this dispute amicably with the Czech side" in talks in January over a Polish coal mine in Turow, which the EU court recently ordered to be closed due to cross-border pollution. "We absolutely do not intend to stop the operations of the mine, the operations of the power plant," Morawiecki also said, however.

An advisory body to the Belgian government on Tuesday suspended a decision by the government to close part of the cultural sector, arguing that new Covid-19 restrictions imposed on theaters are unreasonable. The restrictions took effect on Sunday, but some theatres stayed open in protest. In an emergency procedure, the Council of State ruled that measures concerning the theatre closure were "not proportionate," AP reported.

Russia has attracted international disgust for shutting down its most distinguished human-rights NGO.

Russian deputy prime minister Alexander Novak said the cartel of oil producing countries had agreed not to increase production of oil, resisting pressure from China and the United States.

"This is an unprecedented thing in our history. This is the biggest and deepest crisis of democracy after 1989," Tusk said, who also served previously as the president of the European Council.

Last week, 150 kilograms of cocaine, with a street value of about €7m, was found in the port of Ghent hidden in a ship from Brazil, Brussels Times reported. The Shipping Police responded to a call, when the crew of the Brazilian vessel noticed divers around the ship, but could not find them. The Federal Judicial Police (FGP) East Flanders immediately opened an investigation, report local media.

Belarus' authorities on Monday (27 December) released a draft document proposing amendments to the country's constitution. This may allow President Alexander Lukashenko to further cement his grip on power after months of mass protests and remain in office until 2035. The proposed amendments are published on the president's official website and the website of the state news agency Belta, and Belarusians are encouraged to submit their opinions about the changes.

Nato planes took off a total of 290 times in 2021 to intercept a Russian military aircraft that came too close to a member state. "Very few intercepted aircraft entered Allied airspace," the military alliance said. The number of interventions by Nato countries has fallen compared to last year, when 350 aircraft took off in response to possible Russian threats.

A Russian court on Monday added two more years to a 13-year jail sentence for historian Yuri Dmitriev, in a sex abuse case that his supporters say was trumped up to punish him for uncovering mass graves of Stalin's Gulags, Reuters reported. Dmitriev's supporters say his case is retribution for exposing Stalin's crimes, including the 1937-1938 Great Terror when officials estimate at least 700,000 people were executed.

French prime minister Jean Castex announced on Monday evening that people will need a 'vaccination pass' to enter restaurants, bars, and museums in future.

Russia and the US have scheduled security talks for 10 January, while Moscow continued to belittle the EU.

Law was voted through parliament earlier this month by the ruling nationalist Law and Justice party, Duda's political partners, sparking street protests.

A hospital in Israel is expected to administer the fourth dose of the Covid-19 vaccine to 150 staff on Monday, Reuters reported. The trial taking place in Sheba Medical Center near Tel Aviv will inform experts about the efficiency of a second booster amid concerns for the spread of the more transmissible Omicron variant. A health ministry panel has recommended giving the fourth dose to those aged 60 and above.

Former French prime minister Francois Fillon has become an "independent director" of the Kremlin-linked petrochemicals company Sibur. The move comes after he also joined the board of Russian firm Zaroubejneft in June. The French-Russia revolving door case comes after several Austrian and German politicians also took highly paid Russian jobs after leaving office in recent years, in a practice seen as a form of betrayal in eastern EU states.

Some 60 percent of people said Brexit had gone badly or worse than expected one year after it happened in a poll for the Guardian newspaper published Saturday. Out of those who voted to leave, some 42 percent had a negative view of how it turned out in reality. "We're seeing is a significant minority of Leavers saying that things are going badly," Adam Drummond, from the Opinium pollster, said.

The situation on the Polish-Belarusian border was "calm" over the Christmas weekend, Poland's deputy-interior minister Błażej Poboż said Sunday. "The number of [irregular crossing] attempts is getting smaller, as is the number of people involved," he added. He estimated there were between 3,000 and 4,000 people in the border zone, where temperatures fell to minus 11 degrees Celsius this weekend, amid an ongoing Polish ban on access for aid workers.

German NGO Sea Watch rescued 446 migrants from the Mediterranean Sea in five operations over the holiday weekend, including a heavily pregnant woman and a two-week old baby, DPA reports. The rescues came after Greek authorities recovered 27 drowned bodies on Christmas Eve. Libyan authorities said another 28 bodies washed up on its beaches on Sunday in what has been one of the deadliest years on record for migrant sea-crossings.

Anyone aged 16 and above and living in Switzerland will be able to change their gender by visiting the civil register from 1 January, Reuters reported on Sunday. Younger people and those under legal guardianship will need consent. Only a few countries, such as Ireland, Belgium, Portugal or Norway, allow people to easily change their gender without hormone therapies or medical evaluations - a procedure considered costly and bureaucratic.