Euobserver.com

EU countries have shelved plans to issue a statement of moral support for pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong - due to Hungary's veto. Hungary is a major beneficiary of Chinese investment, including the building of a new university in Budapest.

The latest compromise is part of a trend within the EU, with usually Hungary and Poland pushing for "gender equality" to be deleted from different EU texts - causing worry among other member states.

Jan Hamáček, the Czech interior minister, who was also interim foreign minister in April, hatched a plan to bury evidence that Russia blew up a Czech arms warehouse in 2014, in return for 1m doses of Russia's coronavirus vaccine and letting Prague host a Russia-US summit, according to government sources speaking to news outlet Seznam Zprávy. Hamáček called the report "complete nonsense" and said was suing for €390,000 in damages.

Russia's Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine was as "reliable as a Kalashnikov assault rifle", Russian president Vladimir Putin said on Thursday, in a video-conference with deputy prime minister Tatyana Golikova. The European Medicines Agency is still studying Sputnik V safety prior to EU-wide approval. Hungary has started to use it. But Germany and the Czech Republic have rowed back on previous enthusiasm to give the jab to their nationals.

Clusters of the Indian variants of Covid-19 have been found across England, including in care homes, the Guardian has learned, amid growing fears about the speed with which they are spreading in communities. The latest update of case numbers of these variants was due to be published on Thursday. But leaked emails seen by the Guardian show the announcement was delayed until at least Friday because of local elections.

Current technology enables the world to cut methane emissions by 40 percent by 2030, shaving 0.3 degrees Celsius off rising temperatures, the UN said in a report out Thursday, amid EU deliberations on its first-ever methane-cut targets for energy firms, due this year. "If we want to reduce the rate of warming in the near term, methane is the way," Johan Kuylenstierna, one of the UN report co-authors, told Reuters.

The EU's top court has thrown out an appeal by German chemicals firm Bayer against a partial ban on three pesticides said to harm bees. "The verdict seems to allow the [European] Commission almost carte blanche to review existing approvals upon the slightest evidence," a Bayer spokesman told Reuters. "Protecting nature and people's health takes precedence over the narrow economic interests of powerful multinationals," a Greenpeace spokeswoman also said.

The EU has recommended to member states that Israeli nationals should be allowed to visit the bloc as tourists once again, due to the success of Israel's coronavirus vaccination campaign. The move "paves the way for a gradual return to routine and economic growth after the coronavirus crisis," Israel's foreign minister Gabi Ashkenazi said. People from Australia and New Zealand are also exempt from Europe's blanket ban on foreign tourism.

Israel's foreign ministry has urged EU states to "immediately cease funding for Palestinian organisations that work on behalf of the PFLP terrorist group", amid its indictment of a Spanish national living in the West Bank, accused of duping EU donors to divert "eight-figure" sums to PFLP, which is on an EU terrorism blacklist. Britain, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain, the same day urged Israel to stop building 540 new settlements.

The EU is preparing to help train Mozambique's armed forces, amid wider ambitions for a stronger European military capacity.

The European Commission on Thursday presented a strategy for the development and availability of Covid-19 treatments, including a proposal to invest €90m in population studies and clinical trials. The EU executive will draw up a portfolio of 10 potential Covid-19 treatments by June 2021, identify the most promising ones. Brussels will launch new contracts for the purchase of authorised treatments or drugs by the end of the year.

The European Union is now ready to discuss the proposal to waive temporarily intellectual property rights for Covid-19 vaccines - following the historic decision by Washington in favour of easing patent rules.

The Libyans are demanding more assets, such as patrol boats and planes, for their coast guard. The EU has now floated the idea of tapping into its new European Peace Facility to supply them.

The legal opinion came as the Polish disciplinary chamber discussed removing the immunity of a supreme court judge critical of the government's judicial overhaul.

A group of 11 member states, led by Denmark, wants EU rules for cross-border energy projects to exclude funding for fossil fuels infrastructure. However, member states remain divided on the role of gas in cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

Will this weekend's EU-India summit help translate the recently approved Council conclusions on the Indo-Pacific strategy into more pragmatic set of actions able to elevate Europe in the Asia-Pacific region?

Prison conditions deteriorated last year, due to budget cuts and the pandemic, amid accusations of severe abuse in some EU states, says Council of Europe's anti-torture committee.

Prison conditions deteriorated last year, due to budget cuts and the pandemic, amid accusations of severe abuse in some EU states, says Council of Europe's anti-torture committee.

Two doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine have proved more than 95 percent effective against infection, hospitalisation, and death from Covid-19 in Israel, research found, The Guardian writes. One shot of the vaccine was partially effective, offering 58 percent protection against infection, 76 percent against hospitalisation, and 77 percent against death. The authors of the study in the Lancet medical journal say this shows the importance of having the second shot.

French politician and EU Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier described British prime minister Boris Johnson as a political "bulldozer" who shoves aside his enemies to get things done in a new book out Wednesday. He said Brexiteer Nigel Farage was "in private ... as cordial and gentle as he can be a violent demagogue in public". But he said Brexit negotiator Lord Frost was "cold" and had an "arrogant tone".