Euobserver.com

The office of British leader Boris Johnson said Monday: "If the EU don't respect the sovereignty of the UK, we will leave [without a trade deal] ... and the prime minister is confident that we will prosper." Britain spoke as Brexit talks resumed in Brussels Monday. Irish foreign minister Simon Coveney said there was a "very, very wide gap" on mutual fishing rights, among other issues, however.

French president Emmanuel Macron has accused some European media of "legitimising" Islamist violence. "When I see, in that context, several newspapers which I believe are from countries that share our values ... legitimising this violence, and saying that the heart of the problem is that France is racist and Islamophobic, then I say the [EU] founding principles have been lost," he said in US newspaper The New York Times Monday.

At the same meeting of EU ambassadors, a majority of member states adopted the rules on linking the distribution of EU funds to the respect of rule of law by member state governments.

A report of the European Parliament's environmental management unit proposes a treaty change to move the European Parliament's headquarters from Strasbourg to Brussels - in order for the institution to become climate-neutral by 2030.

At the start of the German presidency of the EU Council it committed itself to a "fair taxation" agenda. But as we enter the final leg of its six-month term, time is running out to make good on this promise.

Although the Covid-19 pandemic has stalled climate negotiations, work has not stopped. The 'Choosing Green' debate will address some of the most important and most complex key areas relating to the global green transition. Live on EUobserver at 10:00 (CET).

Poland and Hungary on Monday blocked the adoption of the EU budget and coronavirus recovery fund, in opposition to a mechanism to linking EU funds to respect for the rule of law. It means the historic €1.8 trillion package, aimed at helping European economies to recover from the pandemic, will not come into force for now. The issue will likely dominate EU leaders' online meeting on Thursday.

US pharmaceutical firm Moderna announced on Monday its potential vaccine was 94.5-percent effective at preventing Covid-19, Reuters reported. An advantage of Moderna's vaccine is that it does not require ultra-cold storage, making easier its transportation and distribution. After Pfizer, Moderna is the second US company to report positive results from its late-stage clinical trial in a week. Last week, Russia announced that its Sputnik-V vaccine was 92-percent effective.

Azerbaijan said Sunday it had agreed to extend a deadline for Armenia to withdraw from a disputed district as part of a peace accord that ended six weeks of fierce fighting over the Nagorno-Karabakh region, the Moscow Times reports. Residents of the Kalbajar district in Azerbaijan began a mass exodus in the days leading up to the initial withdrawal deadline on Sunday, which has now been postponed until 25 November.

A Romanian doctor, Catalin Denciu, has been flown to the Queen Astrid military hospital in Belgium for treatment after sustaining severe burns while trying to save Covid-19 patients during a blaze at a Romanian hospital in the town of Piatra Neamt on Saturday. The show of solidarity comes after Germany and the Netherlands recently began taking in Belgian corona-patients due to lack of intensive-care beds in Belgium.

Fighting between Ethiopian forces and the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) in northern Ethiopia has spread to neighbouring Eritrea, after the TPLF fired rockets at the outskirts of Eritrean capital city Asmara on Sunday. The TPLF said Ethiopia had been using an Eritrean airport to launch air-strikes, in claims Ethiopia denied. The conflict has already created thousands of new refugees in the region, most of whom have fled to Sudan.

Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has angered Cyprus and left-wing Turkish Cypriots by holding a picnic in the hot-button location of Varosha.

A new, China-led free-trade bloc, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), signed Sunday in Vietnam, has eclipsed the EU in sheer size, by pulling together 29 percent of global GDP. The RCEP includes Australia, China, Japan, New Zealand, South Korea, and 10 southeast Asian countries. It was "a victory of multilateralism and free trade", Chinese prime minister Li Keqiang said. India has also been invited to join in future.

US tech firms could be banned from the EU if they do not follow rules, single market commissioner Thierry Breton has told German weekly Welt am Sonntag. "Strict rules must be enforceable. For this we need the appropriate arsenal of possible measures: Impose fines, exclude companies," he said. Breton spoke after Google CEO Sundar Pichai apologised to him by phone Friday, following a leaked 60-page Google strategy-paper on anti-EU lobbying.

Bulgaria is preparing to veto the start of EU accession talks with North Macedonia at EU-affairs ministers' video-talks on Tuesday, its foreign minister, Ekaterina Zaharieva, has said. "Bulgaria is saying 'No' to the start of negotiations," Zaharieva told Bulgarian TV station BTV Sunday. Sofia is pressing Skopje to formally admit North Macedonia's identity and language have Bulgarian roots, quashing the official existence of a Macedonian minority in Bulgaria.

Pro-EU candidate Maria Sandu is on course to win the second round of Moldova's presidential election on Sunday, with some 55 percent of votes against 45 percent for the more Russia-leaning incumbent, Igor Dodon, according to exit polls, Reuters reported. "Today, you have the power to punish those who cheated you," Sandu, a former World Bank economist, said. "I don't want Moldova to be used in geopolitical games," Dodon said.

Police in Minsk used batons and water cannon to attack crowds Sunday, in the 15th weekend in a row of protests against rigged elections in August. They also arrested some 1,000 people nationwide, as EU foreign ministers prepare to discuss a third round of EU sanctions against the regime Thursday. The EU foreign service, last Friday, said the recent police killing of an activist, Roman Bondarenko, was "outrageous and shameful".

The European Parliament has called for gender-equal foreign and security policy. Sweden already has one. But will other EU institutions or member states follow their lead?

The fate of Jonathan Taylor, a British whistleblower stuck in legal limbo in Croatia, is a test of European laws designed to protect those who put themselves at risk for the common good.

Talks between the EU and the UK have moved little, with only seven weeks left until the UK breaks ties with the EU. Negotiations are expected to resume on Monday in Brussels.