About: Iceland Archives

Iceland's opposition filed a motion of no confidence in the prime minister and protesters gathered outside parliament yesterday (4 April) after the Panama Papers showed his wife owned an offshore company with big claims on the country's collapsed banks.

Russia's Foreign Ministry said Sunday (12 April) that moves by Finland and Sweden towards closer ties with NATO were of "special concern".

Calling Russia the biggest challenge to European security, Nordic nations agreed on closer defence ties and increased solidarity with the Baltic states yesterday (9 April), aiming to increase regional security through deterrence.

Iceland yesterday (12 March) announced it was dropping its bid to join the European Union, in line with pledges made by its Eurosceptic government after its election two years ago.

Overshadowed by the highly mediatised Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, the Trade in Services Agreement (TiSA) negotiations are moving along, and will appear on the radar this year, promises Luxembourgish MEP Viviane Reding, responsible for the dossier.

Northern Europe’s 19.7 million shoppers last year spent €200 more online than other EU consumers, about €1,780 each in total, a report has found.  

Iceland has postponed plans to withdraw its application for European Union membership, the government said on Monday (12 May), after protesters called for a referendum.

As the European Commission unveiled its yearly ‘progress reports’ on EU candidate countries yesterday (16 October), an Austrian think-tank revealed that domestic public support for enlargement had hit rock bottom, the EURACTIV network reports.

Iceland said yesterday (22 August) that a recent election which brought eurosceptic parties to power had been interpreted by constitutional advisors as a signal to stop EU accession talks.

The Faroe Islands government has reacted furiously to an EU decision to ban its fish exports to the Union. While the EU accuses the Faroes of overfishing, the small archipelago, which has Danish sovereignty, is threatening to jeopardise multilateral negotiations on herring quota allocations.

European Commission President José Manuel Barroso told the new eurosceptic prime minister of Iceland yesterday (16 July) that his country should decide “without further delay” if it wanted to continue accession negotiations, or abandon plans to join the EU.

The new eurosceptic government in Iceland has announced a halt to the country’s EU accession talks, until Icelanders vote in a referendum within the next four years on whether they want membership negotiations to continue.

Iceland's anti-EU centre-right parties began talks yesterday (28 April) to form a new administration, promising to end years of austerity and provide debt relief to households, but haggling over which one of them will lead the government continues.

Iceland has lowered its mackerel quota in a move that could ease the risk of the European Union barring Icelandic fishermen from its ports.

Norway is failing to live up to its obligations as a member of the European Economic Area (EEA), including imposing extra taxes on EU products and not implementing more than 400 directives, according to an EU report to be published later this year.

The court of the European Free trade Area (EFTA) has ruled today (28 January) in favour of the Icelandic bank Icesave in a row over compensations to hundreds of thousands of savers from the UK and the Netherlands who lost their money when the bank collapsed in late 2008.

 
Iceland’s ambassador to Brussels has denied reports that accession talks with the European Union were dead, telling EURACTIV that only the thorniest negotiating points are on hold until after upcoming elections.

Iceland residents voted overwhelmingly in favour of a new Constitution written by a Constitutional Council of 25 citizens who gathered feedback through social media. 

In its yearly status report on the progress EU hopefuls are making towards membership, the European Commission has good news for Albania, Macedonia and Kosovo. The report - published today (10 October) - also calls for a resumption of negotiations with EU candidate Turkey that are stalled because of the long-running territorial dispute with Cyprus.

Political pressure is growing on Iceland's Parliament to halt accession talks with the EU, or at least review the negotiation procedure, because of the European Commission's involvement in the legal dispute between Reykjavik and British and Dutch authorities over the Icesave case.

The European Parliament adopted yesterday (14 March) resolutions on three countries, representing extremes in terms of their EU accession process: Iceland, which moves on a fast track; Macedonia, the accession talks of which are blocked for a seventh year due to a conflict with Greece; and Bosnia and Herzegovina, where the reform process is stalled.

Iceland began the trial yesterday (5 March) of former Prime Minister Geir Haarde for failing to prevent a 2008 financial crash, thought to be the only prosecution in the world of a political leader over the crisis.

There are many good things that you can say about the EU, but the common fisheries policies has not been successful in fulfilling its objective, the Ambassador of Iceland to the EU, Mr. Thorir Ibsen told EURACTIV. He said there was "nothing wrong" that Iceland, an EU candidate, would help this reform, as it has "more experience in this field than the EU".

Iceland has opened its doors to Bulgarian and Romanian workers, giving them the same rights of free movement and employment that other EU citizens have in the European Economic Area.