Section: European Voice (EU)
Economic blues for the eurozone
The European Commission’s autumn economic forecasts, published on Tuesday (4 November), lay bare the worsening state of the eurozone economy, which is expected to grow by just 0.8% this year, 1.1% in 2015 and 1.7% in 2016. That is well below the trend growth rate of more than 2% in the decade before the financial crisis. Employment will...
Parliament starts review of EEAS
The European Parliament yesterday (5 November) began debating reform of the European External Action Service, with discussion of a recent audit of the first three years of the European Union’s diplomatic service. In an opinion written for the budgetary-control committee and ostensibly connected to the discharge of the EU’s budget for...
Ukraine and Russia strike gas deal
A European Commission-brokered energy agreement to secure the supply of Russian gas to Ukraine and to the European Union this winter was triggered on Tuesday (4 November) when Ukraine’s national gas distributor announced that it had paid Russia a first tranche of debt payments. Under the terms of the agreement signed in Brussels last...
Barroso’s legacy part 4: foreign policy and trade
FOREIGN POLICY History may judge Barroso’s contribution to the EU’s foreign policy by his handling of crises. If so, Barroso might regret that he was too scrupulous in his respect for institutional turf. Europe’s leader during the Ukraine crisis has, without a doubt, been Germany’s chancellor, Angela Merkel, but within the...
Russia’s information warfare
Information warfare is not just about getting your own message across. It also involves confusing, distracting, dividing and demoralising the adversary. That is what Russia is doing to the West, notably through outlets such as RT (the multilingual television channel formerly known as Russia Today). The West has been asleep on this for many years....
EU condemns Ukrainian separatist votes
In her first policy statement as the head of the European Union’s foreign policy, Federica Mogherini has dismissed elections held in separatist-controlled regions of Ukraine yesterday (2 November) as “illegal and illegitimate” and stated that “the European Union will not recognise them”. The statement, which was published yesterday, a day...
The Barroso II legacy – an appraisal: Part I
José Manuel Barroso has stepped down after two terms as president of the European Commission. His second term, from early 2010 until 31 October 2014, was dominated by the eurozone’s economic crisis, which was at its most intense from 2011 to 2013. But an assessment of that second term should – like any assessment of, say, the presidencies...
Russia, Ukraine strike gas deal
Russia has agreed to resume gas supplies to Ukraine after a gap of four and a half months under an agreement that will last through this winter. Russia cut off gas supplies to Ukraine in mid-June in a dispute ostensibly over gas prices and debts but viewed by Ukrainians as another front in Russia’s military and political pressure in...
Ukraine gas deal ‘within reach’
Thirteen and a half hours of three-way talks intended to ensure that Ukrainians receive gas supplies through the winter ended at 4am this morning in Brussels with no agreement between Russia and Ukraine, with the head of Russia’s gas giant Gazprom suggesting that the keys to a solution now lie principally in the hands of the European Union....
Poroshenko acts quickly to form coalition after election victory
The party of Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko has moved swiftly in the wake of parliamentary elections on Sunday (26 October) to form a coalition government with parties that support reforms intended to bring Ukraine closer to the European Union. The Petro Poroshenko Bloc, which gained the largest number of seats in the Verkhovna Rada,...
