Catalan independence leader Carles Puigdemont asked Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy to meet “anywhere but Spain” – where arrest warrants are pending for him and four other members of his cabinet - following last night's election result.
Member states struck a deal with Parliament on cutting emissions by 30% by 2030 from transport, buildings, waste and agriculture sector - but set themselves a later baseline to start counting emissions.
European Commission Vice-President Frans Timmermans announced with a 04:13am tweet that the EU executive had activated Article 7 of the Lisbon Treaty against Poland, due to "a risk of serious breach of of the rule of law".
China launched what will become the world’s largest carbon market on Tuesday (19 December), surpassing the EU’s flagship market mechanism to cap and trade emissions. The scheme is part of a host of major policies China is using to peak its GHGs by 2030.
After almost 18 hours of negotiations, the European Council and Parliament reached a provisional agreement on a proposed package of waste legislation in the early hours of Monday (18 December).
The EU has a trash problem. It used to ship 60% of plastics and 13% of paper collected for recycling to China, but Beijing has decided to curb its appetite for foreign waste.
Migration was confirmed to be the most divisive issue in European politics at the final 2017 EU summit. The Visegrad group (Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic and Slovakia) will pay €35 million, but calling this “solidarity” is ludicrous.
EU member states reached a preliminary agreement with the European Parliament on the land use, land-use change and forestry (LULUCF) regulation on Thursday (14 December), closing the trilogues ahead of a plenary vote in January.
Biofuel producers in the Visegrad countries plus Lithuania and Bulgaria have warned that a phase-out of biofuels will lead to a phase-in of ‘greenwashed’ fossil fuels under the Renewable Energy Directive (RED), as it currently stands in the Council’s proposal.
The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) condemned Italy on Thursday (14 December) for failing to recognise same-sex marriages, a ruling that will result in a token financial compensation for the plaintiffs and more negative publicity for the country.
Fisheries ministers pulled an all-nighter to reach an agreement on fishing limits for 2018, giving Ireland more a €20m windfall. The Council says progress has been made to achieve sustainable management of fish stocks but NGOs say the new limits are above scientific advice. And the industry was caught gate-crashing, again.
Two years ago today, 196 countries signed up to what was hailed as the landmark Paris Agreement. But on its second anniversary, it is probably pertinent to wonder: is the EU still able to claim leadership when it comes to climate action?
The European Court of Auditors (ECA) published a damning report on the so-called greening measures on Tuesday (12 December), stating that they do not meet their environmental objectives.
EU member states and Norway reached a preliminary agreement with the European Parliament late on Thursday night (7 December) on fishing limits in the North Sea ahead of next week's Fisheries Council.
A group of far-right activists attacked Italy’s La Repubblica newsroom with smoke bombs on Wednesday (6 December), in the latest of a series of violent episodes by neo-fascist groups who say they are waging "a political war".
Italy and seven other EU countries asked the European Commission on 24 November to allow them to limit rice imports from Cambodia, on the grounds of “protecting the Italian and European Rice industry.”
Metastatic breast cancer (MBC) has long been disregarded by advocacy groups, researchers and policymakers. As a result, little is known about the scope of the disease, its economic burden and the best way to treat it.
It is not profitable and may never be. And the EU has banned it. So why should seal hunting be supported? Because it is a sustainable way of life for Inuit people - and sometimes their only one. And the way forward for Greenland's independence, says Ditte Sorknæs.
Seal hunting has been associated with images of animal cruelty, Brigitte Bardot hugging a seal pup, and environmental groups asking for it to be banned, which the EU eventually did. The outcome has been disastrous for indigenous people, who traditionally live off the sea, but Greenland is now fighting to turn things around.
The European Commission has proposed a ban on eel fishing in the Atlantic, in an attempt to recover the dwindling stock of the European eel, a critically endangered species that is traded illegally by an industry that is worth millions of euros.
Contrary to the European Commission's initial proposal, the European Parliament voted on Tuesday (28 November) to increase targets for sustainable energy and reintroduce a sub-target for transport, by using "sustainable" biofuels.
An Italian tribunal approved on 22 November the decrees signed by the ministries of agriculture and of economic development to include the country of origin of cereals on rice and pasta labels. The move was welcomed by Coldiretti, Italy’s largest farmers union, but worried the European Commission and pasta makers.
