Euobserver.com

German chancellor Merkel has excluded cooperation between the European Christian Democrats and right-wing populist parties after the European elections after Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban supported co-operation on migration policy with Italian far-right leader Matteo Salvini's planned new EU group. During a visit to Nigeria Merkel, repeated her support for the centre-right's leading candidate Manfred Weber, saying "there will be no cooperation with right-wing parties after the election," Spiegel reported.

With European elections around the corner, press freedom advocates are holding their breath because political change can make for uncertain times.

A new study ranks EU countries according to the influence they try to exert through the size and expertise of their "permanent representations". Finland and Ireland come out on top.

Hungary's Orban has hinted at leaving the EPP for Italy's far-right Salvini, saying it will be difficult to remain in the centre-right political family if it allied with leftist parties after the European Parliament elections.

The EU wants to diversify the sources where it gets its natural gas from - while importing more liquefied natural gas (LNG) from the US could also slightly appease Donald Trump.

The French and Italian presidents will on Thursday commemorate the 500th anniversary of the death of Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci at a French castle where he lived out his days. It comes after some Italian politicians accused France of trying to hijack his identity. "Leonardo is Italian, he only died in France," Lucia Borgonzoni, Italy's junior culture minister said.

Violent antisemitic incidents in Europe went up from 342 in 2017 to 387 last year, according to the European Jewish Congress (EJC). Numbers of incidents including harassment, vandalism, as well as physical assault went up by 74 percent in France and 70 percent in Germany. "Antisemitism has recently progressed to the point of calling into question the very continuation of Jewish life in Europe," EJC head Moshe Kantor said.

Greece (18.5 percent), Spain (14 percent), and Italy (10.2 percent) have the highest unemployment rates in the EU, compared to the EU average (6.6 percent) and to Germany (3.2 percent) and the Czech Republic (1.2 percent) at the lower end, according to European Commission statistics out Tuesday. The Greek figure was lower than last January (20.6 percent), but unemployment for under 25s was 39 percent, the statistics said.

Britain has terminated a contract with ferry companies Brittany Ferries and DFDS despite having to pay more than €58m to scrap the accord. The contract was to see ships take EU imports to other ports than Dover to ease pressure in the event of a no-deal Brexit on 29 March, which never happened. "We sure as certain needed to be ready for it," British transport minister Chris Grayling said.

Eight million British voters have not registered to participate in the EU elections in May, according to Number Cruncher Politics, a British website. Green and Labour Party MPs voiced alarm that many young people, who had not registered, but who tended to oppose Brexit, will not have their say. Guy Verhofstadt, a leading Belgian liberal MEP, said Wednesday he would campaign in the UK to rally the "quiet pro-EU majority".

The election of 73 British MEPs on 23 May, just to get rid of them when Britain leaves the EU, perhaps in October, would create a "messy" situation, European Commission vice-president Jyrki Katainen said in Warsaw Wednesday. "We cannot be in a situation where some MEPs have a partial mandate," he said, but the MEPs' election of a new commission president via a "temporary majority" could cause "questions and troubles".

US firm Airbnb was a digital service provider free to operate across the EU, a senior jurist, Maciej Szupunar, at the EU court in Luxembourg said Tuesday in a non-binding opinion. A French holiday firm had brought the original case, saying Airbnb was a real estate agent and ought to respect local restrictions. The EU court opinion, which the verdict usually follows, said it was "an information society service".

At more than €100bn, Poland has received more EU funding that any other member state since 2004. The European Commission now wants Warsaw to contribute more to EU cohesion funds, join the euro, and stop backsliding on rule of law.

Hungarian PM Viktor Orban hopes to forge a European pact with Italy's Matteo Salvini at a meeting in Budapest on Thursday. In an interview with La Stampa, Orban said "the EPP is preparing to commit suicide and wants to tie itself to the left...we need to find another path via cooperation with Europe's right wing". On migration, Orban called Salvini the "most important person in Europe today".

The European Parliament should have granted access to documents on a decision about how transparent MEPs should be in future with their office expenses, says EU Ombudsman.

Attacks on the rule of law by national governments have been spreading like a virus across Europe and the EU appears to be powerless to contain it.

The EU just de facto ignored Hungary's veto on a statement on Israel, prompting questions on how it makes foreign policy decisions.

Former Estonian prime minister Taavi Roivas has urged the parliament speaker, Henn Polluaas, to replace EU flags in the Estonian parliament after Polluaas, a eurosceptic, had them removed following his confirmation. "Throwing out a flag isn't simply a matter of decoration, but it has a symbolic meaning and symbols matter," Roivas said, with his Reform Party submitting a formal request for a U-turn on the flag decision Tuesday.

Roman Catholic archbishops from Germany, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg have urged Europeans to turn out and vote in the European Parliament elections to combat "the threats of Brexit, populism, and nationalism". "Our vocation as Christians is ... to engage with Europe for the common good," they said in an open letter. The appeal was unusual, Luxembourg archbishop Jean-Claude Hollerich said, but Europe was facing a "threat", he added.

The EU has urged Venezuela to "avoid the loss of lives" after the army clashed with supporters of opposition leader Juan Guaido in Caracas Tuesday. "The European Union rejects any form of violence and calls for utmost restraint," foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said. Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro has accused Guaido of a failed coup, but most EU states and the US have said he ought to take power.