Author: staff

The Trump administration’s foreign aid overhaul has thrown the broader humanitarian community into chaos. The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), an initiative spearheaded by tech billionaire and Trump adviser Elon Musk, has effectively dismantled the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), leading to massive layoffs and the closure of critical food and development programs. A federal judge ruled this week that DOGE’s actions “likely violated the U.S. Constitution in multiple ways,” but stopped short of reversing the cuts. With money running low, WFP is making deep cuts to its programs. Food rations have been slashed for refugees in Bangladesh, Kenya…

The U.K. prime minister and his top security adviser worked intensively to rescue the broken relationship between Kyiv and Washington, drafting a truce plan that might one day pave the way for peace. Mar 12 9 mins read

Kallas’s failure to push through her plan underlines the difficulty of corralling all 27 countries in a common direction. The blow to Kallas’s authority is evident. “If you say everywhere, as she does and she’s right, that we need to maintain unity, then you also have to prepare such important initiatives in a unity manner,” a senior EU diplomat complained. “This should have been discussed.” It’s not clear what happens from here with her arms effort, but Ukraine still has the overwhelming backing of EU countries. In what’s becoming something of a habit, 26 countries minus Hungary approved a joint…

While the Commission has vowed it’s a one-time emergency measure, lawmakers are having flashbacks: The same procedure was used in 2020 to pass the €700 billion Covid-19 recovery fund. Now the Parliament’s leaders fear it could become a pattern. “Why would you seek a solution that goes around your best ally on this topic, where majorities are clear? I can tell you that it is a point shared unanimously, quite [rarely] by all political groups in the Parliament,” Metsola said. On March 5, shortly after the Commission unveiled her multi-billion rearmament plan, von der Leyen got a unanimous earful from…

The Kremlin reacted to the news with jubilation, with Russian Olympic Committee President and Sports Minister Mikhail Degtyarev congratulating Coventry in a post on Telegram. “We expect that in the era of the new leader, the Olympic movement will become stronger … and Russia will return to the Olympic podium,” he said. Since Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, which the IOC called a violation of the Olympic charter, Russian and Belarusian athletes have been barred from competing in the Games under their own flag; they are instead represented by a neutral banner. Russian athletes who “actively support” Russia’s…

BRUSSELS ― Emmanuel Macron is planning to host a group of European leaders on Thursday, March 27, to discuss Ukraine and security in Europe, three officials told POLITICO. The summit is a follow-up to the French president’s February and March gatherings of European and NATO leaders in Paris to discuss defense guarantees for Ukraine and the wider continent. The meeting will come as European leaders scramble to boost the European Union’s defense capacities in the face of threats from Russia and drastic changes to U.S. foreign policy under President Donald Trump. It also reflects increasing political buy-in for a “coalition of…

The new adaptation of the fairytale had been commissioned for a campaign designed to give 10-year-old pupils a book to read over the summer. The French Ministry of Education has cancelled an order for a modernised illustrated version of “Beauty and the Beast” intended for 10-year-old children, after it was deemed inappropriate. The government had commissioned the new rendition of the popular fairytale as part of its annual “A book for the holidays” campaign, through which 800,000 pupils receive a copy of an updated literary classic to read over the summer.This year, the task had fallen upon cartoonist Jul, famous…

Ultimately though, tough wording threatening additional sanctions on Russian energy and trade goods might mean little, given actually implementing it at an EU level still does require unanimity — and Hungary has time and time again blocked proposals to tighten the remaining loopholes. “Orbán chose isolation and a path of illiberal democracy against the obvious interest of the EU and, in fact, Hungary. He was given many opportunities and rejected extended hands,” said a second diplomat. “The security of Europe is too serious of an issue to negotiate with one person who sees things 180 degrees differently than everyone else.”…

Prosecutors accuse İmamoğlu of exploiting his position for financial gain, including the improper allocation of government contracts. Thousands of people have gathered outside Istanbul’s city hall for a second consecutive night to protest against the arrest of the city’s mayor, which many view as a politically driven attempt to eliminate a key rival from the next presidential race.Ekrem İmamoğlu, a prominent political opponent of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, was arrested after a dawn raid on his residence on Wednesday as part of investigations into alleged corruption and terror links.Prosecutors accuse him of exploiting his position for financial gain, including the improper…

The company has 40 days to decide whether it will take further legal action. Amazon has said it is considering an appeal against a decision of a Luxembourg national Court which upheld a record privacy fine of €746 million euro imposed on the tech giant, a spokesperson for the company told Euronews. Amazon now has 40 days to decide on the appeal.The case goes back to a fine issued by the Luxembourg Data Protection Authority (CNPD) in 2021 against Amazon for violating the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) for failing to ask for consent of data processing of online…