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The EU moved closer to starting accession talks with Serbia yesterday (25 October) after overcoming long-standing opposition from the Dutch government. Belgrade said a "new era" in its history had begun. BETA, EURACTIV's partner in Serbia, contributed to this article.

Officials are considering removing visa-free travel for Western Balkan citizens as growing numbers of asylum-seekers from these countries hit the borders of Sweden, Belgium and Germany.

French President Nicolas Sakozy hosted a trilateral summit with Germany and Russia to prepare for his country's G20 presidency, finding temporary refuge in world affairs as more than a million people took to the streets of France over planned reform of the pension system.

With Ukraine as a reliable partner, Russia doesn't need the South Stream gas pipeline and can pump any amount of gas in "whatever direction" it wishes, Mykola Azarov, prime minister of Ukraine, said yesterday (13 October) in a joint interview with EURACTIV, Bloomberg and Reuters.

Following France's controversial expulsions of illegal Roma migrants, most of whom were EU nationals of Romanian and Bulgarian origin, Paris has signalled its opposition to lifting visa requirements for Bosnian and Albanian citizens. EURACTIV.fr contributed to this article.

Turkish citizens derive much stress and frustration from the fact that they can only visit the EU with a visa, which is difficult to obtain and applications are sometimes refused, Murat Dinç, a local youth leader for Turkey's main opposition party CHP, told EURACTIV in an interview.

The European Commission today (27 May) adopted proposals to enable citizens of Albania and Bosnia and Herzegovina to travel with biometric passports to the Schengen countries without requiring visas. If the countries satisfy a number of outstanding requirements, visas could be lifted by autumn.

After Serbia, Macedonia and Montenegro, whose citizens enjoy visa free travel in the Schengen space, the next country to break the visa barrier will be Ukraine, the country's Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister Ukraine Konstantin Yelisieiev told EURACTIV in an exclusive interview.

The successful preparation of Euro 2012 will be a moral application for Ukrainian EU membership, the country'se deputy foreign affairs minister, Konstantin Yelisieiev, told EURACTIV in an exclusive interview.

A conflict between Libya and Switzerland has now begun to affect the EU after Tripoli decided not to issue any visas to nationals from the Schengen countries from 15 February. The move comes after Bern banned 188 high-ranking Libyans, including the country's leader, Muammar Gaddafi, from entering Switzerland.