Euobserver.com

In Brussels, PR professionals and lobbying consultants are working for some of the world's most autocratic regimes. And we have no way of knowing for sure who they are, how much they are paid, or what they are up to.

Belgian Mischael Modrikamen is working with US strategist Steve Bannon to make the new hard-right grouping 'The Movement' go global. First step: a summit in January in Brussels, and high-level talks are underway, possibly with Brazil's far-right presidential contender.

Germany has led EU criticism of Saudi Arabia over the killing of dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi at its consulate in Turkey. "Nothing has been cleared up," German chancellor Angela Merkel said Saturday. Arms exports to Saudi Arabia should be halted until the case is fully understood, German foreign minister Heiko Mass said. The killing was a "shocking violation" of an international treaty on consular relations, the EU foreign service said.

Seven hundred thousand people marched in London Saturday to call for a second referendum on Brexit. They were joined by pro-remain MPs, such as Anna Soubry and Sarah Wollaston from the ruling Conservative party. The situation in the UK risked causing "massive ... political damage", Britain's deputy foreign minister Alan Duncan said. A rival pro-leave rally organised in London the same day by eurosceptic MEP Nigel Farage attracted 1,200 people.

Eighty out of 120 MPs in Macedonia voted to change the country's name to Northern Macedonia on Friday. The vote was the first in a series needed to ratify the name-change deal with Greece that could unlock Macedonia's Nato and EU bids. It comes despite the fact a recent Macedonian referendum on the matter failed due to low turnout. "Today is a historic day," Macedonian prime minister Zoran Zaev said.

The European Commission has asked Italy to clarify the contents of the draft budget by Monday 22nd October.

Europe is increasing the suffering of migrants, including children, on the EU's only land border with Africa, the archbishop of Tangiers has said.

The Polish government has pledged to uphold EU law in the face of a court order to halt its judicial purge.

MEPs gather in Strasbourg for a second plenary in October to discuss plastics, Facebook, and the future of Europe.

EU countries on Friday authorised the European Commission to open negotiations with the US on imports of high-quality, hormone-free beef and to review a quota for imports of such beef. The EU insisted the move, seemingly aimed at courting US president Donald Trump, is not part of the wider US-EU trade discussion and does not mean the EU would lift its ban on hormone-treated beef.

The EU's top court called on Polish authorities to immediately suspend forcing judges into early retirement and reinstate those who have already left the Polish supreme court before the Luxembourg court rules on whether the country's judicial reform violated EU rules. The European Court of Justice (ECJ) issued the "interim measure" on Friday requested by the European Commission, which is investigating if Poland's judicial reform breaks EU rules.

June's G20 summit, the first ever to be hosted by Japan, will focus on circular economy, Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe told leaders at the Asia-Europe meeting (Asem) in Brussels on Friday. "Circular economy is a key-word for the future of Asia and Europe," he said. Abe supported the European strategy for connecting Europe and Asia and announced a Japanese initiative to remove plastic garbage from the oceans.

Tax scams operated by the EU's top lenders cost treasuries €55.2bn, new revelations show, as Merkel gives green light to banking union.

Italy's draft 2019 budget is a "significant deviation" from EU budget rules, the European Commission said in a letter sent on Thursday to Italy's finance minister Giovanni Tria. The letter is the first step in the so-called semester procedure, allowing the commission to give recommendations on national budgets. The commission asks Rome to engage in a "constructive dialogue" and to answer before noon on Monday 22 October.

Following Canada's legalising of cannabis this week, Spain's anti-austerity Podemos party has picked up the issue and is considering proposing legalising the drug, reports El Pais. Under Podemos' plan, the state would be in charge of handing out licences to plant, harvest and sell the crop. "It's absurd that you can buy tequila or gin from a supermarket but marijuana is illegal," Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias said.

German chancellor Angela Merkel said on Thursday that EU leaders agreed during a summit in Brussels to move forward with the banking union and a deposit guarantee. The decision was not included in the formal conclusions of the summit, but inspired Denmark's prime minister, Lars Lokke Rasmussen to suggest Denmark - a non-euro country and centre of the Danske Bank's money laundering scandal - should join the banking union.

A case of mad cow disease, bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), has been discovered on farm in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, the Scottish government confirmed on Thursday. It is the first case confirmed since 2015. Other cattle on the farm have been traced and isolated, and will be destroyed in line with EU requirements. A massive outbreak throughout the 1990s resulted in a worldwide ban on beef exports from the UK.

Following success in last week's Bavarian elections, the Greens appear set to be the big gainers again in Hessen elections on 28 October, jumping into second place with 22 percent support, according to a Forschungsgruppe Wahlen poll for broadcaster ZDF. The Greens doubled their vote in Bavaria, doubled it in Luxembourg elections and scored more than 30 percent in Belgium's local elections, all three held on 14 October.

In recent decades, Poland has been failing its women and girls by eroding access to safe and legal abortion through increasingly conservative and sexist policies.

Covering two-third of the world's economic output and governing more than half of the world's population, the Europe and Asian leaders' summit in Brussels on Friday tests potentials for outlining a post-Trump world order.