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"Years of intensive work and engagement with strategic stakeholders, since the publication of the Action Plan on Financing for Sustainable Growth in March 2018, led to an ‘ambitious’ sustainable finance strategy with one key priority in line with EU solidarity: leave no industry nor Member State behind."

“Revising the EU taxonomy to fuel the journey towards industrial decarbonization”

By: EBR | Wednesday, March 31, 2021

In June 2020, after complicated and tedious inter-institutional negotiations, the European Parliament adopted at second reading the compromise regulation for the establishment of an EU framework (the so-called ‘taxonomy’) to facilitate sustainable investment

"In 2019, a quarter of electricity production in the EU was generated by nuclear energy. Proponents say it is ‘indispensable’ to become climate neutral by 2050, nuclear energy is not only CO2 neutral but also unlike solar and wind energy permanently available."

EU ‘Green Label’ for nuclear energy?

By: N. Peter Kramer | Wednesday, March 31, 2021

What position does nuclear energy have in the fight against global warming? A heated debate about this question takes place in the EU and many of its member states

The Commission’s plans for the exclusion of third countries from certain elements of the programme recognise quantum computing as of “global strategic importance” that has “extensive uses in security and dual-use technologies.”

EU nations scold Commission on plans to exclude UK from research groups

By: EBR | Wednesday, March 31, 2021

A contingent of EU nations has locked horns with the European Commission over plans to exclude third-countries from involvement in quantum and space research projects, in a move that could see the UK’s involvement significantly downgraded due to concerns over intellectual property

"Across the world, governments are assessing how to structure their economic recovery from the pandemic and ratchet up climate action ahead of the global climate conference in Glasgow at the end of the year."

How the European Commission is underselling climate action

By: EBR | Wednesday, March 31, 2021

A blanket 10% rate of interest on borrowing is being assumed for the European Commission’s upcoming 2030 package of climate and energy laws

"Any agreement is likely to upset someone: Britain’s most passionate Brexiters, the EU’s most fervent federalists, or both. Complaints of surrender are likely."

The UK and the EU Are Dancing for a Relationship

By: EBR | Wednesday, March 31, 2021

The loud boasts of defiance by the British government toward the EU have given way to the quieter language of negotiation. The outcome will determine just how much post-Brexit sovereignty London will have

Advocates say that greater obligations for some of the world’s biggest tech firms to introduce interoperable elements into their systems would help to level the playing field in terms of competitiveness in the digital economy.

EU SMEs in bid for greater interoperability in Digital Markets Act

By: EBR | Tuesday, March 30, 2021

Forty pan-European tech companies have penned a letter to MEPs calling for support for bolstered interoperability requirements in the Digital Markets Act (DMA) while stressing the importance of keeping the rules aligned to developments in the area across EU nations

The European Union’s so-called ‘taxonomy’ is a key part of the bloc’s sustainable finance agenda as it looks to funnel billions of euros into activities that will help it reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

Poland, others step up push for gas in EU green finance rules: document

By: EBR | Tuesday, March 30, 2021

Poland, Bulgaria and seven other countries have stepped up their push to ensure natural gas is classed as a sustainable investment under EU finance rules, warning Brussels its latest proposal falls short

Closing the Wiener Zeitung would mean the loss of some 100 jobs at an especially difficult time for everyone working in the media, and when Austria has slipped to 18th place in terms of media freedom according to the Reporters Without Borders index.

Is an EU directive killing the oldest newspaper in the world: the Wiener Zeitung?

By: EBR | Monday, March 29, 2021

The oldest daily newspaper in the world still publishing, the ‘Wiener Zeitung’, is in danger of being closed down

"While Germany goes to the polls in six months, on September 26, the public’s attention is still elsewhere."

Merkel’s Fall from Grace

By: EBR | Monday, March 29, 2021

Germany’s long-term leading government party faces an uncertain political future

French President Emmanuel Macron warned Thursday that the European Union would have to do more and beef up its already massive €750 billion ($885 billion) virus recovery fund as a result.

Pandemic upsurge hits Europe recovery hopes

By: EBR | Monday, March 29, 2021

An upsurge in new coronavirus cases is forcing governments across Europe into new, damaging lockdowns that threaten to delay a much hoped-for return to growth

Due to the pandemic, travellers want “safe, clean and more sustainable tourism”, Parliament says, calling on member states to fully implement common criteria for safe travel without delay.

MEPs demand safe and clean travel

By: EBR | Friday, March 26, 2021

EU criteria for safe and clean travel, a common vaccination certificate and an EU hygiene seal for businesses must be part of a new EU strategy on tourism, MEPs say

"In 2020, the EU rejected austerity politics in favor of a redistributive recovery fund, which raised the EU’s seven-year budget to €1.8 trillion ($2.1 trillion). A green and digital transformation of the economy seemed to signal a reinvention of the European model."

European Leaders Are Facing Their Armageddon

By: EBR | Friday, March 26, 2021

Europe’s messy handling of the second and third waves of the coronavirus pandemic and the stalling of vaccination programs highlight the EU’s deep contradictions. The union’s ability to bounce back—let alone bounce back better—is now in question

"The Conference on the Future of Europe will be an important opportunity to hear from the citizens what they expect from Europe."

European political parties play a key role now and in the future

By: EBR | Friday, March 26, 2021

The Conference on the Future of Europe should not be a PR exercise but a genuine people’s convention to deliberate all the tough issues we face together and to hear what citizens expect from Europe

“We intend to table the proposal by June this year, with the aim to make the levy operational from 2023 onwards.”

Commission on track for digital levy proposal by June

By: EBR | Wednesday, March 24, 2021

The European Commission is on track with plans to present a digital tax by June despite recent progress at the level of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)

“There is absolutely no trace of any involvement of private operators in this project,” Olivier Onidi, Deputy Director-General of the Commission’s DG HOME told MEPs in the Civil Liberties Committee.

Commission seeks to calm fears over Europol’s decryption platform

By: EBR | Wednesday, March 24, 2021

The European Commission has issued assurances to MEPs that Europol’s new decryption platform will not be used to abuse data protection standards and will maintain closely guarded access rights over the data retrieved

“Yes. There’s a big problem. We’re dealing with it. And what about your human rights issues?”.

Why Europe Need Not Fail Over Human Rights

By: EBR | Wednesday, March 24, 2021

The Biden administration is making the defense of human rights one of its foreign policy priorities. Other democracies, particularly in Europe, should actively support this shift

“The world still has a “fighting chance” to limit global warming by ending dependence on coal,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said earlier this month.

Why Europe’s role must be to lead the world out of coal for good

By: EBR | Wednesday, March 24, 2021

As European energy and environment ministers join their peers at the International Energy Agency’s COP26 Net-Zero summit, they must set the pace for the global phase-out of coal

The EU’s updated proposal for gas plants is part of its Sustainable Finance Taxonomy, which defines what economic activities can be marketed in Europe as sustainable investments from next year.

EU to offer gas plants a green finance label, under certain conditions

By: EBR | Tuesday, March 23, 2021

The European Union plans to label some gas power plants as sustainable investments, after an initial proposal to deny them a green label faced a backlash from a group of 10 EU member states

“For the first time since the Second World War, there is a real risk that the generation of today’s young adults ends up less well-off than their parents. Europe cannot afford to lose the most educated age group it has ever had and let generational inequality condemn its future.”

European recovery sidelines the young generation

By: EBR | Tuesday, March 23, 2021

Despite being the most affected group by the coronavirus-induced crisis, young Europeans feel increasingly left out from the plans for post-pandemic recovery

"The EU needs a different catch-up strategy."

The EU’s ’digital compass’ is no road map to success

By: EBR | Tuesday, March 23, 2021

This decade, according to the European Commission, is going to be ‘the digital Twenties’, with the EU recovering ground it has lost both as user and producer of the new technologies that are key to future wealth and prosperity. But how can it be achieved?