Category Archives: Europe

Why is UK publishing a ‘command paper’ on Northern Ireland protocol?

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Trading arrangements continue to be a significant flashpoint in relations with Dublin and Brussels

Just seven months after it came into force, the Northern Ireland protocol is proving once again a significant flashpoint in the UK’s relations with Dublin and Brussels.

On Wednesday, the UK published a “command paper” on the protocol. Some will see it as an attempt to tear up the agreement Boris Johnson struck in 2019, others will see it as a serious attempt to fix a deal they argue was flawed from the beginning but signed to help the British prime minister to get Brexit done, as he had promised.

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‘I never thought this would happen in France’: day one of showing Covid vaccine pass

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Showing a health pass or negative PCR test is obligatory if people want to access cultural venues

There are teething troubles on day one of France’s controversial health pass for accessing public places. Outside Montpellier’s main art gallery, the Musée Fabre, a security guard squints at a visitor’s smartphone. “I can’t see your pass,” he says. The visitor tries shielding it from the severe Mediterranean sun: “I don’t see anything either. I can’t even see whether my phone’s unlocked or not.”

From Wednesday, showing either a health pass, or proof of a negative PCR test dated to within 48 hours, is obligatory in France for anyone wishing to access any cultural or leisure facilities with a capacity of more than 50 people. This includes cinemas, art galleries, libraries, museums, sports centres and work-related events. Cafes, restaurants and trains will fall under the measures at the beginning of August.

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UK says it wants to substantially rewrite Northern Ireland Brexit protocol

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Blueprint for alternative arrangement published as sources say protocol was flawed at conception

The UK has launched an audacious bid to rewrite a key plank of the Brexit deal, saying the Northern Ireland protocol was flawed at conception but served its purpose to get the UK out of the EU as “one country”.

The European Commission immediately ruled out a renegotiation of the deal, which was trumpeted by Boris Johnson as a solution to the Irish border impasse two years ago. The commission is understood to be open to some changes on the special arrangements for Northern Ireland, however.

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Priti Patel accused of throwing good money after bad over Channel migrants

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Tory MP criticises home secretary over £55m deal with France to double number of patrols off its coast

Handing £55m to French authorities to clamp down on migrants crossing the Channel in small boats is “throwing good money after bad”, the home secretary has been told by a Conservative colleague as she was grilled by MPs.

Priti Patel revealed late on Tuesday that she had agreed to pay the sum as part of a deal with the French interior minister, Gérald Darmanin, to double the number of officers patrolling the French coast.

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Hungary’s Viktor Orbán will hold referendum on anti-LBGT law

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Prime minister announces referendum on ‘child protection’ three days before Budapest Pride march

Hungary’s far-right prime minister, Viktor Orbán, has announced that his government will hold a nationwide referendum on “child protection”, a euphemism for parts of a recent law widely condemned as discriminatory that bans any portrayal of LGBT people in materials meant for children.

“LGBTQ activists visit kindergartens and schools and conduct sexual education classes. They want to do this here in Hungary as well,” said Orbán in a Facebook video statement placed on Wednesday.

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Catastrophic floods could hit Europe far more often, study finds

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Slow-moving storms such as recent deluge in Germany could become 14 times more frequent by 2100

Catastrophic floods such as those that struck Europe recently could become much more frequent as a result of global heating, researchers say.

High-resolution computer models suggest that slow-moving storms could become 14 times more common over land by the end of the century in a worst-case scenario. The slower a storm moves, the more rain it dumps on a small area and the greater the risk of serious flooding.

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Sicilian towns face bankruptcy over Etna clean-up costs

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Italian government earmarks €5m to help villages get rid of volcanic cinders from erupting volcano

Dozens of Sicilian towns face bankruptcy due to the cost of cleaning up the volcanic ash left by Mount Etna, which has been erupting regularly since February.

The Italian government on Monday allocated €5m to compensate several villages struggling to pay to get rid of the volcanic cinders, the cost of which can reach more than €1m with every eruption.

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Infectious nightclubs: Covid outbreaks serve as risk alert

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Nightclubs across the world have been linked to outbreaks, leading some countries to open up to vaccinated clubbers only

They only wanted to enjoy themselves on the sunny Sardinian coast last summer after a tough two-month lockdown. But instead, young Italians, who had frequented nightclubs, returned home either with Covid-19 or laden with feelings of guilt, regret or anger at the authorities.

Nightclubs, such as those in Spain, France, the UK, Austria and Thailand, have triggered coronavirus outbreaks since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic.

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Germany’s Greens cautious over linking floods to climate crisis

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Party leaders hope public will draw its own conclusions from last week’s catastrophic floods

It was a slogan that cut to the chase: “Everybody is talking about Germany. We talk about the weather.”

The provocative message – itself an inversion of the title of an essay by Red Army Faction terror group founder Ulrike Meinhof (“Everybody talks about the weather. We don’t”) – was at the heart of the West German Green party’s 1990 election campaign, but has rarely felt more relevant than today as catastrophic floods in western Germany have brought extreme weather events to the centre of the national debate little more than two months before federal elections.

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‘The most disturbing liturgy ever’: Irish burglar gets highly charged send-off

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A screwdriver and a torch, tools of a nocturnal trade, carried to altar at funeral of Dean Maguire

Father Donal Roche called it the most disturbing funeral he has ever attended, a homage to a life of crime played like a scene from The Sopranos.

Dean Maguire, 29, an Irish burglar with more than 25 convictions, had died in fiery motorway crash and mourners decided to give a memorable farewell.

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Alarm grows over migrants’ hunger strike in Brussels

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Belgian government under pressure to offer residence permits to hundreds of migrants on hunger strike

The Belgian government is under pressure to offer residence permits to several hundred migrants, some of whom are “between life and death” after a weeks’ long hunger strike in Brussels.

Undocumented migrants have been on hunger strike in a central Brussels church and university buildings for nearly 60 days in an attempt to secure residency papers.

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Turkish Cypriot leader: ‘The only way forward is a two-state solution’

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Self-avowed nationalist Ersin Tatar in ebullient mood despite embargos, isolation and political restrictions

It’s been nine months since Ersin Tatar assumed the presidency of the self-declared Turkish republic of Northern Cyprus and, like his predecessors, he has found little has changed.

Embargos, international isolation and political restrictions remain perennial problems for his unrecognised state. Even today, nearly 38 years after the territory proclaimed independence, foreign dignitaries pass through his colonial-era office and still object to being photographed next to the flags on his desk.

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Widow denies organising murder of her British husband in Ukraine hit and run

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Julianna Moore, formerly Ganna Ziuzina, told an inquest she did not seek to profit from Barry Pring’s death, as his family alleges

The widow of a wealthy British businessman killed in a hit and run in Ukraine as he celebrated his first wedding anniversary has denied organising his murder, an inquest heard.

Barry Pring, 47, suffered fatal injuries when he was hit by a vehicle using a stolen number plate while waiting for a taxi outside a restaurant in Kiev with his wife, Ganna Ziuzina, on 16 February 2008.

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German flood alert system criticised for ‘monumental failure’

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Questions raised over lack of warning as death toll passes 150 and villages are left without drinking water, power or gas

Germany is asking itself how one of the world’s richest countries managed to be taken by surprise by last week’s extreme weather events, as more details emerge of how early warnings about record rainfall and expected floods did not make their way to the communities most at risk.

In Erftstadt, south of Cologne, where a flooded gravel quarry swallowed up cars, houses and parts of a historic castle, residents who had installed the federal government’s weather warning app were advised on Wednesday to stay inside their house.

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Italy likely to toughen Covid rules with curbs on unvaccinated people

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Government expected to bar unjabbed from some indoor venues and launch ‘green pass’ for travel

The Italian government is expected to impose restrictions on unvaccinated people as it scrambles to stem a resurgence in Covid-19 infections.

In a similar move to that seen in France, those not fully vaccinated could be barred from being served indoors at restaurants and bars and from entering stadiums, museums, theatres, cinemas, swimming pools and gyms.

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Europe’s unluckiest train station gets new lease of life as hotel

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Once-grand Canfranc was known as the Titanic of the mountains, but fell into disrepair thanks to fire, derailment and war

It earned the nickname “Titanic of the mountains”, but now the monumental and ill-fated train station at Canfranc is to get a new life as a five-star hotel, 51 years after the international rail link across the Pyrenees closed.

The story of Canfranc, a village more than 1,000 metres (3,280ft) above sea level on the Franco-Spanish frontier, is one of vainglorious ambition and abject failure, of incompetence and corruption, of intrigue, smuggling and a century-long run of bad luck.

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Kurt Westergaard, Danish cartoonist behind Muhammad cartoon, dies aged 86

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Westergaard was known for drawing a caricature of the prophet Muhammad which sparked outrage around the Muslim world

Danish artist Kurt Westergaard, known for drawing a caricature of the prophet Muhammad that sparked outrage around the Muslim world, has died at the age 86, his family told Danish media on Sunday.

Westergaard died in his sleep after a long period of ill health, his family told newspaper Berlingske.

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Russia rights group linked to Navalny closes amid prosecution fears

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Team 29 is the latest victim of Kremlin crackdown on organisations it considers ‘undesirable’

A rights group in Russia has announced it is shutting down, citing fears its members and supporters may be prosecuted after authorities blocked its website for allegedly publishing content from an “undesirable” organisation.

Team 29 – an association of lawyers and journalists specialising in treason and espionage cases and freedom of information issues – said on Sunday that Russian authorities accused it of spreading content from a Czech non-governmental organisation that had been declared “undesirable” in Russia.

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Beta prompts UK moves over France – but all variants could flourish after Monday

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Analysis: making fully vaccinated travellers returning from places with lower infection rates quarantine, while the virus runs wild here, is difficult to comprehend

Boris Johnson’s pendulum swing from “freedom day” to unlocking with “extreme caution” relayed a shift in the government’s thinking – that the relaxation of almost all restrictions at this stage comes with significant risk. The move to make fully vaccinated people returning from France continue to quarantine – because of the risk of the Beta variant – appears to be another sign of panic setting in.

Delta, the dominant variant in the UK, is far more transmissible than the Beta variant, which was first identified in South Africa. But the danger of Beta has long been its ability to thwart any vaccine shield, particularly the AstraZeneca jab. Beta actually preceded Delta – it was first recorded in the UK in December but never quite took off. In South Africa, it has dominated. It also accounts for about one in 10 new infections in France, but that data includes the French territories of Réunion and Mayotte, where the variant is almost dominant.

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Chien film festival: Tilda Swinton’s dogs win canine award at Cannes

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Actor starred with springer spaniels Snowbear, Dora and Rosy in The Souvenir Part II

It is one of the most sought-after prizes in the movie world; not the celebrated Cannes Palme d’Or for best film, awarded on Saturday night to French entry Titane, but its animal alternative the Palm Dog.

This year’s coveted leather collar award conferred for the best canine performance on screen was given to Tilda Swinton’s three springer spaniels as the prize celebrated its 20th anniversary – its 103rd in dog years.

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