⊂ EUROPE ⊃
Zelensky asks EU leaders for solidarity: In a video address to the European Parliament on Tuesday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called on European leaders to “prove” their solidarity with his country, just a day after signing an official request to join the European Union. Zelensky said his country is „fighting for survival“ amid the Russian invasion, „but we are also fighting to be equal members of Europe.” European Council President Charles Michel said that “it will be up to us Europeans to rise to the occasion.” The European Commission is expected to issue an opinion on Ukraine’s candidate status, and the Council will not “escape” its responsibilities and will have to “seriously analyse the symbolic, political, strong and, I believe, legitimate request that has been expressed.” EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine had had the effect of uniting countries against Russia.
cnn.com, politico.eu, reuters.com
- Neutral Swiss join EU sanctions against Russia in break with past reuters.com
- France to target Russian oligarchs luxury items over Ukraine invasion rfi.fr
- Ukraine seeks immediate connection to Western electricity grid politico.eu
- EU to help Ukraine with intelligence from own satellite centre reuters.com
- Hungary will not allow lethal weapons for Ukraine to transit its territory reuters.com
EU to ban seven Russian banks from SWIFT: EU ambassadors agreed to exclude seven Russian banks from the SWIFT financial-messaging system but spared the nation’s biggest lender Sberbank PJSC and a bank part-owned by Russian gas giant Gazprom PJSC. VTB Bank PJSC and Bank Rossiya are among the banks that face a ban from the messaging system that enables trillions of dollars worth of transactions around the world, according to officials familiar with the decision. bloomberg.com
Historic sanctions on Russia had roots in emotional appeal from Zelensky: As EU leaders gathered for an emergency summit on Thursday night, momentum was already moving toward imposing tough new sanctions on Russia over its invasion of Ukraine. But a handful of key leaders, notably including German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, were reluctant to proceed with some of the harshest proposals. Then Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky dialed into the meeting via teleconference with a bracing appeal that left some of the world-weary politicians with watery eyes. In just five minutes, Zelensky — speaking from the battlefield of Kyiv — pleaded with European leaders for genuine help in its fight with the Russian invaders. “It was extremely, extremely emotional,” said a European official briefed on the call. “He was essentially saying, ‘Look, we are here dying for European ideals.’” Before ending the video call, Zelensky told the gathering matter-of-factly that it might be the last time they saw him alive, according to a senior European official who was present. washingtonpost.com
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Elon Musk says Starlink active in Ukraine as Russian invasion disrupts internet: SpaceX billionaire Elon Musk said on Saturday that the company’s Starlink satellite broadband service is available in Ukraine and SpaceX is sending more terminals to the country, whose internet has been disrupted due to the Russian invasion. On Monday, Ukraine digital minister Mykhailo Fedorov, who tagged Musk in a request on Twitter on Saturday, posted that Starlink was “here” in Ukraine — with a photo showing more than two dozen boxes of the company’s user kits in the back of a truck.
reuters.com, cnbc.com
ECB stress-tests banks‘ Russia exposure: The European Central Bank (ECB) is telling lenders active in Russia to report on the risks they face from a range of diplomatic and military scenarios related to Moscow’s tensions with the West over Ukraine, according to people familiar with the matter. The Frankfurt-based ECB is working with banks to assess risks to their liquidity, loan books, trading and currency positions as well as their ability to keep operations running. bloombergquint.com
Satellite outage knocks out thousands of Enercon’s wind turbines: Germany’s Enercon on Monday said a „massive disruption“ of satellite connections in Europe was affecting the operations of 5,800 wind turbines in central Europe. „The exact cause of the disruption is not yet known. The communication services failed almost simultaneously with the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine,“ Enercon said in a statement. reuters.com
EMA backs Moderna shot for ages 6-11: The European Medicines Agency on Thursday backed giving a booster shot of Pfizer and BioNTech’s COVID-19 vaccine to adolescents aged 12 and over, as well as the expanded use of Moderna’s shot in children ages six to 11. The moves come after several EU countries already started to offer booster doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to teens. reuters.com
EU supply chain law: Large companies operating in the European Union could be held responsible for environmental violations or human rights abuses committed by businesses in their supply chains under a law proposed on Wednesday by the European Commission, the bloc’s administrative arm. “We can no longer turn a blind eye on what happens down our value chains,” said Didier Reynders, the European Union’s commissioner for justice. nytimes.com.
IPCC depicts unfolding climate emergency: A stark picture of an unfolding climate crisis that is especially impacting vulnerable communities fills the latest report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the United Nations body for assessing the science related to climate change. Authored by 270 scientists who assessed over 34,000 studies, the report singles out Africa, Asia, Central and South America, small island nations and the Arctic as areas that are especially being impacted by heatwaves, droughts, floods and rising seas — weather extremes that are also driving biodiversity loss and mass mortalities in species such as trees and corals. dw.com
Social taxonomy: Companies that produce affordable medicines, are active in elder care or provide other social benefits should be more attractive to investors in the future, according to experts. A group of experts commissioned by the EU Commission presented a recommendation on how the Brussels authority should shape its so-called social taxonomy. n-tv.de
EU Parliament postpones vote on crypto regulations: The parliament has postponed its vote on the proposed regulatory package for crypto assets after a leaked draft drew criticism for including a provision that sought to ban the use of cryptocurrencies like bitcoin and ether in the EU over energy concerns. coindesk.com
Rights of Brits abroad not equal to EU citizens‘ after Brexit: British citizens who live in the EU should no longer have the same rights as EU27 citizens after Brexit, according to an opinion published Thursday by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU). Irish Advocate General Anthony Collins wrote that Britons “who enjoyed the benefits of union citizenship do not retain those advantages following the UK’s withdrawal from the EU” after it had “voluntarily abandoned” the status of being a member country. politico.eu
Iran: Talks in Vienna aim to revive the deal that put limits on Iran’s nuclear programme. npr.org
For the first time more autocracies than democracies: The number of authoritarian governments continues to increase, according to a study by the Bertelsmann Foundation. According to the report, of 137 countries examined, only 67 were democracies, while the number of autocracies rose to 70. Seven countries are newly classified as autocracies. It is the first time since the beginning of the study that the number of autocracies is higher than that of democracies. welt.de
Mediterranean: Aegean incident reported between Greek coast guard, Turkish fishing boat ekathimerini.com
European Payments Initiative (EPI): Project for European payment procedure loses three prominent supporters faz.net
⊂ QUOTE OF THE DAY ⊃
„I am proud of how the European citizens at the borders are showing concrete solidarity with Ukrainians fleeing this terrible, aggressive war.“
The EU needs to prepare for millions of Ukrainian refugees arriving in the bloc, EU Home Affairs Commissioner Ylva Johansson said on Sunday.
reuters.com
⊂ COUNTRIES ⊃
Cologne Carnival festivities morph into anti-war rally: Carnival is hugely popular in parts of western Germany, especially in Rhineland cities such as Cologne. But this year the city’s traditional „Rosenmontag“ Carnival parade had been called off due to the Covid pandemic. The war in Ukraine, however, brought 250,000 people for a solidarity parade. Thousand of revellers in Cologne swapped traditional Carnival festivities for an anti-war rally to send a message against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. dw.com
Poland rejects accusations that it is turning away non-white people fleeing Ukraine: Nigeria and South Africa have expressed alarm at reports that their nationals are being stopped from leaving war-torn Ukraine. The reports, denied by both Polish and Ukrainian officials, have cast a pall on the massive evacuation effort that has already seen half a million civilians cross into the European Union. Anna Michalska, a spokesperson for the Polish border guards, said she had spent “the past two days denying such allegations”: “I don’t know what is happening on the Ukrainian side of the border, but we let everyone in regardless of nationality,” she said. france24.com
Russian cargo ship seized in the English Channel: France on Saturday intercepted a Russian vessel in the English Channel in line with new EU sanctions against Moscow. The cargo ship was transporting cars and left Rouen bound for St. Petersburg. However, French sea police redirected the vessel to the port of Boulogne-sur-Mer in northern France. cnbc.com
Former French PM Fillon resigns from board of Russian firms: Former French Prime Minister Francois Fillon said on Friday he had resigned from the boards of two Russian firms in protest over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. „Vladimir Putin alone is guilty of having started a preventable conflict,“ Fillon wrote in an opinion piece for French weekly paper Le Journal du Dimanche. He said that in such conditions, he could not continue being a member of the boards of Russian state-controlled oil company Zarubezhneft and petrochemical company Sibur. reuters.com
Gerhard Schröder’s office staff quit over Putin’s war on Ukraine: The office manager of Germany’s former Chancellor Gerhard Schröder has resigned due to his boss‘ refusal to quit lucrative positions at Russian gas companies. A total of four employees quit their jobs at Schröder’s office over the issue. Last week, Schröder criticised Putin’s war via LinkedIn, but maintained that „both sides made mistakes,“ sticking to his stance that NATO expanded too far east following the end of the Cold War, thus provoking the Kremlin. politico.eu
Bulgarian PM obtains the defence minister resignation over Ukraine comment: Bulgarian Defence Minister Stefan Yanev has been asked to resign by Prime Minister Kiril Petkov on Monday after he caused outrage in the government by stating that the Russian invasion of Ukraine should not be called “war”. euractiv.com
German health minister warns against ending lockdown: As other European countries are ending their Covid lockdowns and relaxing measures, German Health Minister Karl Lauterbach said other countries could not be a model for Germany in the pandemic: „We have to work with our own rules, and they must always take into account Germany’s special position.“ He said in Germany there was still a large group of unvaccinated older people aged 60 and over. zeit.de
- Czech Republic, Slovakia and Poland lift most Covid restrictions tagesschau.de
- Iceland lifts all restrictions reuters.com
- Netherlands return to normalcy france24.com
- Italy to end Covid emergency reuters.com
- New research points to Wuhan market as pandemic origin nytimes.com
Boris Johnson first PM to be ‚questioned under caution‘: Boris Johnson has become the first British prime minister to be questioned under caution by police, a leaked copy of Scotland Yard’s Partygate questionnaire for Downing Street staff suggests. As part of its investigation into allegations of 12 events in breach of coronavirus rules – six of which Johnson is reported to have attended – the Metropolitan Police has sent questionnaires to all those suspected of rule-breaking. independent.co.uk
Queen: Elizabeth II resumes work after coronavirus scare. nytimes.com
Germany aims to get 100% of energy from renewable sources by 2035: Germany aims to fulfil all its electricity needs with supplies from renewable sources by 2035, compared to its previous target to abandon fossil fuels „well before 2040,“ according to a government draft paper obtained by Reuters on Monday. reuters.com
End of combustion engine era: German Transport Minister Volker Wissing caused confusion at his first meeting with European colleagues in the Council of Transport Ministers. He declared that the German government supports the EU Commission’s climate plans, which envisage a de facto end to the sale of new petrol and diesel vehicles from 2035. Immediately afterwards, he explained that the sale of combustion vehicles that run on so-called e-fuels should remain permitted. handelsblatt.com
Germany: Climate activists try to block roads to airports: Members of the group „Uprising of the Last Generation“ last week protested by blocking access to Germany’s three largest airports. The group has been calling on the German government to commit to more legal measures to end food waste, which it says contributes to both hunger and climate change. dw.com
Leader of Spain’s main opposition party is ousted: Pablo Casado this week suffered the implosion of his leadership of the People’s Party (pp), Spain’s mainstream conservative opposition. At a meeting that lasted into the early hours of February 24th, the party’s regional barons allowed him to save face by staying on as a figurehead until an emergency party congress on April 2nd. In return he agreed to back as his successor Alberto Núñez Feijóo, the experienced president of the region of Galicia who is the consensus choice. economist.com
Merkel defends Germany’s handling of refugee influx: Former German Chancellor Angela Merkel justified her controversial stance at the beginning of the refugee crisis in 2015 with respect for human dignity. „Our Article 1 of the Basic Law says: Human dignity is inviolable. And that doesn’t just apply to Germans,“ she said in the TV portrait „Angela Merkel – In the course of time“ by documentary filmmaker Torsten Körner. spiegel.de
Slovakia sets new trial in case of murdered journalist Jan Kuciak: Slovakia has announced a new trial against the business executive alleged to have ordered the murder of Slovak investigative journalist Jan Kuciak and his fiancée Martina Kusnirova four years ago. aljazeera.com
Switzerland extradites key figure of ‚Cum-Ex‘ scandal to Germany: Swiss authorities on Thursday extradited a German lawyer sought by Germany on account of being a key leader of a massive tax fraud scheme called „Cum-Ex.“ Hanno Berger was handed over to German police officials in the city of Konstanz in southern Germany, prosecutors based in Frankfurt said. dw.com
Finland and Sweden debate Nato membership: Russian aggression in Ukraine has pushed the Finnish public closer than ever to NATO. Finnish political parties gathered on Tuesday to discuss Russia’s attack on Ukraine and Finland’s role in Europe’s new power balance. Finland’s potential NATO membership will also be on the table, Prime Minister Sanna Marin told reporters Monday. A survey by the Finnish broadcasting company Yle found that 53% of Finns support their country joining NATO. This figure goes up to 66% if neighbouring Sweden were also to join NATO. politico.eu
Denmark authorises construction of gas pipeline from Norway to Poland euronews.com
France: War changes the election campaign politico.eu
Norway decides to drop Russia from $1.3 trillion wealth fund bloomberg.com
Nazi-looted art: Kandinsky painting returned to Jewish heirs by Amsterdam museum nytimes.com
France: Parliament approves extending abortion limit to 14 weeks euronews.com
Amsterdam Apple store hostage taker dies from injuries, prosecutors say washingtonpost.com
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⊂ LAST BUT NOT LEAST ⊃
Dog votes in French right-wing primary: The French party Les Républicains says it will sue French daily Libération over its investigation alleging voting from dead people — and a pup. Libération published a broader investigation on the right-wing party’s membership roll, alleging fraudulent practices aimed at artificially inflating the number of members of Les Républicains. The paper said it found on the party’s list people who do not exist, some who have died, and a number of Chinese immigrants, some of them not fluent in French, who said they joined at the request of community leaders. Libération said a dog named Clovis allegedly also cast a ballot in France’s right-wing primary last December, which saw Valérie Pécresse elected as Les Républicains’ candidate to contest April’s presidential election. politico.eu