Author: staff

Published on 21/10/2025 – 8:03 GMT+2 The world’s most glamorous train service is adding a new journey linking two of Europe’s most timeless destinations. From spring 2026, the Venice Simplon-Orient-Express will launch its first-ever route from Paris to the Amalfi Coast. The lavish experience connects the French capital with Ravello via a three-night trip across both the French and Italian Rivieras. In a twist, the experience also includes a two-night stay in a five-star hotel. Ride the rails, then stay in luxury The Venice Simplon-Orient-Express, operated by Belmond, will debut its Paris-Amalfi Coast itinerary on 4 May 2026. The journey…

In preparation for the meeting, EU ambassadors informally agreed draft European Council conclusions seen by POLITICO that call on the Commission to put forward a proposal that is “underpinned by appropriate European solidarity and risk-sharing.” This text is “the political go-ahead” for the Commission to issue a proposal after Thursday’s meeting, a Belgian diplomat said. “I’m not so worried about Belgium” creating problems in the European Council, echoed an EU diplomat from another country. Belgium has taken a cautious approach because it hosts Euroclear, the financial body that holds the frozen assets, and fears a court could force it to…

Nicolas Sarkozy this Tuesday becomes the first former French president in living memory to be imprisoned as he begins a five-year sentence in Paris’ La Santé prison for criminal conspiracy in an attempt to use Libyan money to finance his 2007 election campaign. The right-wing president of France between 2007 and 2012, Sarkozy has always maintained his innocence but will, in any case, serve his sentence in a prison that has housed some of the most well-known prisoners since the 1800s. They include Capt. Alfred Dreyfus, wrongly convicted of treason because he was Jewish, and the Venezuelan militant known as…

Friedrich Merz hat seine erneuerte Strategie gegen die AfD vorgelegt. Die untermauert er mit starken Worten, sie hat aber schwache Perspektiven. Im Podcast blickt Gordon Repinski auf das Szenario einer ostdeutschen Landtagswahl 2026, in der die CDU zwischen Linken und AfD steht und kein Ausweg ohne Dilemma bleibt.Im 200-Sekunden-Interview spricht Christina Stumpp, stellvertretende CDU-Generalsekretärin, über rote Linien, Tolerierung und Zusammenarbeit. Eindrücke, die aus dem Interview entstehen könnten, hat sie noch vor Veröffentlichung dementiert. Das gab’s so in unserem Podcast auch noch nicht.  Außerdem erklärt Rasmus Buchsteiner, wie der Kanzler jetzt die Dinge jetzt zur Chefsache machen will: Rente, Wehrdienst, Bürgergeld…

Young farmers struggle to find available and affordable land to start working. One hectare of arable land in the EU costs almost €12,000. That price rises to over €90,000 on average in Meedendorp’s native Netherlands, up from €56,000 a decade ago.  “When you start, the banks ask for guarantees your parents can’t give — it’s a vicious circle,” said Florian Poncelet, a 29-year-old beef farmer who heads Belgian regional young farmers’ association FJA. Roy Meijer, chair of the Dutch young farmers farmers’ group NAJK, put it bluntly: “Banks look at young farmers as risk. If you’re 25 and want to…

But setting different ages might prove difficult to implement, for example, if teens are traveling between countries. 3. What’s the right age? There’s a hot debate on what the right minimum age should be, with 15 or 16 being the main contenders. Denmark, France and Greece are in the 15 and above camp. Denmark is moving ahead, with Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen announcing plans this month to demand parental controls for social media platforms for children under 15. Spain supports a digital age of majority at 16, which Slovakia has also previously expressed support for. Australia — one of the…

BRUXELLES ― Les dirigeants européens se livrent au combat de leur vie. Pour la première fois, le sommet qu’ils organisent cette semaine se concentrera sur des sujets visant à reprendre du terrain à l’extrême droite. Les responsables politiques issus des partis traditionnels, qu’ils soient de centre droit, de centre gauche ou libéraux, sont au pouvoir en Europe depuis la Seconde Guerre mondiale, mais ils voient leur hégémonie s’estomper. Ils espèrent que le Conseil européen de jeudi — qui réunit les 27 chefs d’Etat et de gouvernement — montrera que l’UE se préoccupe des sujets qui ont créé du mécontentement chez…

“Clock-changing must stop,” Juncker told lawmakers, insisting that daylight saving shifts would end by October 2019 at latest. “We are out of time.” But Juncker’s proposal irritated national leaders, who questioned the Commission’s mandate for proposing such a shift, let alone imposing a short timeline for its costly implementation. Then-Portuguese Prime Minister António Costa — who became the president of the European Council last year — rejected the idea altogether, citing the advice of technical experts who said the change would be detrimental to his country’s citizens. Greece, too, was opposed to the change. The split among national leaders permitted…

LUXEMBOURG— Ukraine shouldn’t have to give up territory as part of a peace deal with Russia, the EU’s top diplomat Kaja Kallas said on Monday after U.S. President Donald Trump pushed Kyiv to give up land to end the war. “If we just give away the territories, then this gives a message to everybody that you can just use force against your neighbors and get what you want,” Kallas told journalists in Luxembourg after a meeting of foreign ministers. “I think this is very dangerous. That’s why we have the international law in place, [so] that nobody does that.” The…

In her letter, von der Leyen opens the door to an increase in credit use, writing: “Part of the target — 3% in the Commission’s proposal, which ministers will further discuss — can be reached with high-quality international credits. Our domestic target … can be lower than 90%, as long as this is compensated by similar … reductions outside of the EU.”  She also responded to a key demand from governments to adjust the bloc’s new carbon price on transport and heating, plans that were controversial from the beginning as they are expected to lead to higher fuel bills for most consumers. …