Euobserver.com

The British queen Elizabeth II has called on UK citizens to listen to one another, as the divided country heads towards Brexit. "Even with the most deeply-held differences, treating the other person with respect and as a fellow human being is always a good first step towards greater understanding," she said. It was her last Christmas speech before the UK is to leave the EU in March 2019.

Some 20 percent of respondents to a Eurobarometer poll mentioned terrorism - down from 44 percent in early 2017.

When Austria took over the EU presidency, chancellor Sebastian Kurz declared that his government - in a coalition with the far-right FPO - would use its six-months tenure to promote what he called "a Europe that protects".

From lobbying of EU commissioners, to MEPs struggle to keep their so-called 'expenses', to dodgy think-tanks, to Erdogan's torture chambers, EUobserver has proudly broken original stories on the EU institutions in 2018 - under our ethos of 'Independent. Investigative. Influential.'

EU allies have voiced dismay on Trump's sudden idea to pull out of Syria, amid fears of a resurgence in Islamist terrorism, Kurdish massacres, and fresh surges of refugees.

Closing coal mines in the Silesia region will be particularly difficult, says Witold Stepien, a senior local politician from the neighbouring region Lodz.

Some see it as a provocation, while other as a gesture to Catalonia, that Spanish prime minister Pedro Sanchez has decided hold Friday's cabinet meeting in Barcelona instead of Madrid. The meeting marks the first anniversary of a regional election called by Madrid after Catalan autonomy was suspended in the wake of an independence referendum. Pro-Catalan independence leaders, still in jail, have called for the expected protests to be peaceful.

EU ministers have agreed to a new EU space programme for the years 2021-2027, including setting up a new EU Agency for the Space Programme based on the existing European GNSS Agency, that deals with Europe's satellite navigation systems. The agreement does not include a budget, which will form part of overall EU budget talks. The council's position must now be agreed with the European parliament.

"Gatwick's runway is currently available and a limited number of aircraft are scheduled for departure and arrival," the airport announced on Friday morning after traffic was disrupted on Thursday, affecting more than 100,000 passengers due to drones seen over the airfield. Police reported more than 50 sightings of a drone. BBC quoted police sources saying that finding the drone's operator was "a difficult and challenging" prospect.

Despite public protests, Hungary's president Janos Ader has signed a controversial new law that increases overtime by 60 percent yet delays payment for it for three years. Ader said employees must give written consent and would not be penalised for refusing extra hours. The law aims to tackle labour shortages. The Hungarian unemployment rate, at 4.2 percent in 2017, is one of the lowest in the EU.

EU environment ministers agreed in Brussels on Thursday with the proposal from the European Commission that as of 2025, new trucks and buses should emit 15 percent less CO2 compared with 2019. They also said a 30 percent reduction target by 2030 should be binding, while the commission only proposed an "indicative" target. The European Parliament wants a 20 percent reduction by 2025. Negotiations can now begin.

With US forces leaving, there is a realistic scenario that Turkey would seize the opportunity to invade Rojava, killing the aspirations of the Kurds for autonomy in a federal Syria in the future, similar to the situation in Iraq.

Failure to comply with EU safety requirements for ski lifts is punished very differently across EU member states - posing a problem for the sector, as unscrupulous firms could set themselves up in states where fines are the lowest.

The French data protection authority has fined US company Uber €400,000 for not revealing there had been a massive breach of personal data. The breach happened in 2016, but Uber did not inform users until November 2017. Of the 57 million affected users, 1.4 million resided in France. Last month, Dutch and UK data protection authorities already gave Uber fines of respectively €600,000 and £385,000.

The EU court has annulled a 2015 decision to freeze the assets of former Ukrainian PM Mykola Azarov, on the grounds that EU states failed to follow due process in accusing him of corruption. But Azarov's EU assets remain frozen until at least March 2019, because post-2015 EU decisions to keep him blacklisted included "new reasoning" - meaning that he has to fight separate appeals against those decisions.

Latvia was wrong to have suspended its central bank chief from his job over bribery allegations, an EU jurist has said, as Europe struggles to clamp down on financial crime.

There is room for cautious optimism in Slovakia, but the chilling effects of Jan Kuciak's murder may be felt for some time and continued international scrutiny is important.

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US president Donald Trump claimed on Wednesday victory over the Islamic State terror group in Syria, saying he would pull US troops out of the country. Leader of the liberal group in the European Parliament, Guy Verhofstadt, in a tweet called the move a "victory for Russia, Iran, Turkey, Turkish proxies & the Syrian regime" and said it "leaves Europeans more vulnerable".

The murders of two young female Scandinavians in Morocco "is investigated as an act of terror," Danish PM, Lars Lokke Rasmussen, said in a press conference on Thursday. Danish 24-year-old Louisa Vesterager Jespersen and Norwegian 28-year-old Maren Ueland were killed while hiking in the High Atlas Mountains. "A video of the killing is circulating on the internet this morning," Rasmussen said, adding that one suspect had links to extremist networks.