European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana said on Wednesday he had held "constructive" talks with Iran’s main nuclear negotiator in his first contacts with the Iranians since he visited Tehran last week. "I had a phone conversation today [Wednesday] with Mr Ari Larijani. It was a constructive conversation," Solana told reporters in Brussels.
The commander of a European Union force helping to provide security for elections next month in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) expressed confidence on Tuesday that his mission will be successful despite rising ethnic tensions ahead of the poll. But critics say the mission is largely a promotional exercise.
Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni raised the possibility on Tuesday that a blast that killed eight Palestinian civilians last week on a beach was due to a terrorist’s bomb and not Israeli shell fire. The Palestinians were killed as a result of an explosion on a beach in the northern Gaza Strip on Friday as they picnicked on one of the hottest days of the year.
The European Union is keen to trumpet its latest role in easing the Iran nuclear crisis, but strains and institutional limbo are clouding the bloc’s efforts to punch its diplomatic weight, officials admitted on Thursday. EU foreign policy head Javier Solana stands ready to return to Tehran to negotiate with the Islamic republic over a package of trade and political incentives.
At least 115 trade unionists were murdered for defending workers’ rights in 2005, while more than 1 600 were assaulted and about 9 000 were arrested. Nearly 10 000 workers were sacked for their trade union involvement, and almost 1 700 detained, according to the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions’ (ICFTU) annual survey.
The African Union has asked Nato to prolong its mission in Sudan’s violence-wracked Darfur region to help back a peacekeeping operation there, an alliance spokesperson said on Wednesday. ”The AU has asked Nato to extend its current support to the end of September,” said spokesperson James Appathurai.
European Union defence ministers were on Monday seeking to fill gaps in the military force they are planning to send to the Democratic Republic Congo in support of United Nations peacekeepers during key elections across the vast African nation.
The European Union is preparing a bold offer for Iran, including economic, nuclear, and perhaps security guarantees, to try to curb its atomic ambitions, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said on Monday. "It will be a generous package, a bold package, that will contain issues relating to nuclear, economic matters, and maybe, if necessary, security matters," Solana said.
Europe faces an increasing threat from attacks with long-range missiles and could help avert the danger by building a missile-defence network, a senior North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Nato) official warned on Wednesday. "There is a growing threat of long-range missile attacks," said Marshall Billingslea, head of Nato’s Conference of National Armaments Directors.
The European Union on Wednesday suspended talks on forging closer ties with Serbia, punishing Belgrade for failing to cooperate fully with UN prosecutors hunting Ratko Mladic and other war-crimes fugitives. Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn said the talks on a stabilisation and association agreement — a precursor to any membership talks — were postponed mainly because Mladic, the former Bosnian-Serb commander wanted for genocide, remained at large.
Microsoft began a challenge on Monday before the European Union’s second-highest court of the European Commission’s landmark antitrust ruling against it, arguing that the future of innovation in the technology industry was at stake. In an opening statement, Microsoft lawyer Jean-Francois Bellis said the commission made ”serious errors” in its decision two years ago that the company abused its dominant market position.
Microsoft said at the start of a final day of hearings with European Union (EU) regulators on Friday that it was more optimistic about its antitrust battle and still hoped to stave off fines of â,¬2-million (,4-million) a day. The hearing is the company’s last chance to defend itself before the EU decides whether to levy the fines.
The European Union approved on Wednesday a blacklist of nearly 100 airlines considered to be unsafe, nearly all of which will be banned from EU skies, officials said. Most of the carriers are based in Africa and there are blanket bans on airlines from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sierra Leone, Equatorial Guinea, Liberia and Swaziland.
The European Union will sign a deal on Monday with the United Nations granting â,¬64-million (-million) in urgent aid for the Palestinians, but much more in future funding is under threat after the formation of a government by Hamas, a group the Europeans consider a terrorist group.
Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf said here on Monday she hoped international sanctions on the country’s forestry and diamonds sectors would soon be lifted. Once one of Africa’s most prosperous nations with abundant timber, rubber and mineral wealth, Liberia lies in ruin after more than 14 years of civil war.
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/ 15 February 2006
European experts scrambled on Wednesday to hammer out a response to a fast-developing bird-flu threat, as the lethal H5N1 strain spread into Germany, the latest country to be hit by the virus in days. The H5N1 strain has killed at least 90 people mostly in eastern Asia, but also in Turkey and northern Iraq.
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/ 7 February 2006
Hundreds of thousands of businesses raced on Tuesday to snap up ".eu" internet domain names, with "sex.eu" taking the prize for the most sought-after address on the first day companies could apply. Within the first hour, sex.eu domain had received 23 applications, followed by schumacher.eu with 15, realestate.eu with 12 and business.eu also with 12 applications.
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/ 1 February 2006
European Union regulators are still waiting for details from Microsoft on an offer to reveal secret computer code to meet an EU anti-trust ruling, competition commissioner Neelie Kroes said on Tuesday. "We have not yet received full details from Microsoft. When we do, we will review the information carefully," she told the European Parliament’s economic and monetary affairs committee.
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/ 30 January 2006
The European Union warned Hamas on Monday that it will have to fundamentally change to win support from the 25-nation bloc, which has long been the Palestinians’ biggest aid donor. The warning to Hamas came from EU foreign ministers, who were meeting to discuss the militant Islamic group’s shock election win last week.
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/ 25 January 2006
The European Commission approved on Tuesday the €3,1-billion takeover of United State giant Reebok by its German rival Adidas to create the second biggest sports goods firm in the world. Adidas-Saloman immediately hailed the decision, which gives a green light for the transaction nearly six months after it was first announced last August.
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/ 23 January 2006
It may not have the Eiffel Tower’s global renown, but Belgium’s hi-tech Atomium hopes to super-charge its pulling power when it reopens next month, in all its shiny glory after a two-year renovation. In fact, the parallels with the world-famous Paris monument are striking: the steel-and-aluminium Brussels landmark was built for a World Fair; and it attracts hordes of foreign tourists.
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/ 23 December 2005
A decomposed body discovered in a Brussels canal a week ago is that of a Rwandan former minister indicted by a United Nations tribunal on charges of genocide, a family lawyer said on Thursday. The naked body was discovered by a passer-by in the Brussels-Charleroi canal in the heart of the Belgian capital.
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/ 20 December 2005
British Prime Minister Tony Blair pressed European Union lawmakers on Tuesday to back a hard-won budget deal to unlock money for poor EU newcomers, while stressing the need for a reform of the whole funding process. But party group leaders bluntly warned that the EU legislature will fight for more money.
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/ 14 December 2005
Jean-Marc Bosman five-year court battle ended victoriously in 1995, allowing players to move without transfer fees and effectively ending European leagues from limiting players from other European countries. But now, he’s asking himself whether he really won anything.
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/ 28 October 2005
The European Union offered on Friday to reduce average agricultural tariffs by 47%, its steepest farm tariff cuts to date, in a proposal aimed at breaking a deadlock in world trade talks. ”The EU’s offer is substantial, offering new market access in agriculture,” EU trade commissioner Peter Mandelson said.
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/ 25 October 2005
The European Union prepared on Tuesday to slap a global ban on imports of pet birds into Europe, amid rising alarm over the growing avian influenza threat from Asia. EU veterinary experts in Brussels were studying proposals for an initial one-month ban on imports of pet birds such as parrots and other exotic species from the rest of the world.
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/ 16 October 2005
The growing threat of lethal bird flu spreading across Europe will soar to the top of European Union leaders’ menu this week, after the deadly Asian strain of the virus landed on the continent for the first time. The H5N1 virus was confirmed in Romania at the weekend, only two days after its presence was identified in Turkey.
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/ 15 October 2005
The European Union was awaiting test results on Saturday that should show whether a lethal strain of bird flu that has killed more than 60 people in Asia has reached Europe. Bird flu has been detected in two Romanian villages and the tests will prove whether this is the fatal H5N1 strain. The deadly strain has been detected in Turkey.
European countries responded swiftly to Saturday’s massive earthquake that hit Pakistan, India and Afghanistan, offering aid and funds as well as condolences. The European Union’s executive arm, said up to â,¬3-million could be approved within a day if requested by agencies working on the ground.
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/ 30 September 2005
Microsoft’s chief executive Steve Ballmer will meet with the European Union’s antitrust chief next week, her spokesperson said on Friday, as the company appeals a March 2004 ruling by EU regulators. Neelie Kroes planned to meet Ballmer over breakfast on Wednesday to discuss general antitrust issues, EU spokesperson Jonathan Todd said.
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/ 29 September 2005
European Union foreign ministers will meet in Luxembourg on October 2 in an eleventh-hour bid to finalise guidelines for membership talks with Turkey, scheduled to start a day later. Diplomats said ministers will focus on overcoming Austrian demands that Ankara be offered a watered-down partnership instead of full membership of the 25-nation bloc
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/ 21 September 2005
European Union diplomats hammered out a new accord on Turkey on Wednesday, overcoming last-minute objections from Cyprus, but the bloc is still battling to clear the way for membership talks with Ankara next month. While progress was made, clear strains remained over whether the vast Muslim state can ever join the bloc, with Austria notably demanding that Turkey be offered an alternative to EU entry.