EU leaders reaffirmed their commitment for six Western Balkan countries to join the Union, but held off opening full negotiations with Albania and North Macedonia at a one-day EU Summit in the Slovenian city of Brdo. “The Western Balkans are part of the same Europe as the European Union. The
The government is currently discussing investments with 14 South Korean companies, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said after meeting his opposite number Chung Eui-yong and Trade Minister Yeo Han-koo in Paris on Wednesday. President Moon Jae-in will next month become the first South Korean head of state to visit Hungary
Zagreb has come out in support of the G20 political agreement based on a proposal to tax multinational companies. It will bring greater tax fairness, according to Croatia’s finance minister, Zdravko Marić, who said his country is in favor of the global mechanism that is planned to be enshrined
With hopes of Bulgaria lifting its veto on North Macedonia’s potential bid to join the European Union, today Bulgaria’s president, Rumen Radev, will get a chance to meet with the prime minister of North Macedonia, Zoran Zaev, at a high-level gathering in Slovenia including Chancellor Angela Merkel and
Corruption allegations against prime minister Andrej Babis are dominating the headlines in Czechia as its citizens prepare to go to the polls on Friday and Saturday. Already reeling from his ANO party’s fall in support during September – from 32.4% to 27.3%, according to pollster STEM – the oligarch
With the country seeing a massive surge of the COVID-19 pandemic and having to deal with a tenuous international credit rating, now Romania’s government has failed to pass through a no-confidence vote today, 5 October. Romanian prime minister Florin Citu and his minority-led coalition had only been in power
Vice President of the Hungarian Energy and Utilities Regulatory Authority, Pál Ságvári, expects high gas and energy prices to stay high over the next few months. He compared the situation to a “perfect storm,” given that in recent months there were temporary supply disruptions on both the Russian and Norwegian
Czech prime minister Andrej Babis is one of the most prominent active politicians featured in the so-called Pandora Papers, a massive trove of information from offshore services firms totaling 11.9 million secret files – published on 3 October by the International Consortium of Investigate Journalists. According to the revelations, Babis,
Leaders of EU member states and six countries in the Western Balkans – known as the WB6 – will renew vows of a “shared future” at Brdo Castle near Slovenia capital Ljubljana on 6 October. President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen travelled to all of the WB6 capitals in
At the first meeting of the newly founded EU-US Trade and Technology Council (TTC) the EU and the US governments have set the stage for closer technological cooperation and a sharing of progressive trade rules. The aim of TTC is two-fold: simultaneously support domestic industries and achieve a higher level
MEP Klara Dobrev emerged as the frontrunner in Hungary’s first ever primary election to select a united-opposition candidate to stand against Prime Minister Viktor Orban, on Wednesday. Dobrev, an MEP for the left-leaning Democratic Coalition party that was founded by her husband, ex-premier Ferenc Gyurcsany, won around 34% of
Electric car sales more than doubled in 2020 in the European Union, and are up by 130% for the first half of this year. That’s why electric auto manufacturers from China are looking to make inroads into Europe, where the European Union is pushing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions
How do you organise a major global exhibition in the Covid-era? Exhibitions manager and curator at World Press Photo, Sanne Schim van der Loeff, told CET how she and her colleagues have kept the show on the road, as it opened at the Hungarian National Museum in Budapest. World Press
If licensing doesn’t hold things up, the construction of an interconnector designed to help countries around the Baltic Sea diversify their sources of natural gas is scheduled to begin deliveries in the second half of 2022, according to Lithuania’s energy minister, Dainius Kreivys. Once completed, the pipeline will
Hauliers associations in Poland and Hungary say their members are not interested in the UK government’s offer of three-month work visas as an attempted solution to its growing petrol queues and lorry driver shortage. Over a million Poles and hundreds of thousands of Hungarians have lived and worked in
Hungary has signed a long-term agreement with Russia’s Gazprom, which will supply 4.5 billion cubic meters (BCM) of natural gas over a 15-year period at a significant discount from what the country has been paying – a situation which has created tensions between Hungary and Ukraine, whose gas pipeline
Estonia’s one-billion-euro recovery plan was approved by the European Commission on Sunday, the country’s finance minister Keit Pentus-Rosimannus announced. The funds will be spent on digital and environmental projects as part of the EU’s Green New Deal and Next Generation schemes. Of the money, 200 million euros
Uncertainty could loom over Europe for some time following this past weekend’s German elections, which did not produce a clear winner. Although the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) won by a narrow margin of 1.5% ahead of the center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU), a long and wary period
The average price of energy for households in Budapest is 10.63 eurocents / kWh, which ranks the Hungarian capital first – the cheapest – among the EU capitals. Electricity prices were even lower in Belgrade, Serbia. The highest prices among EU capitals were registered in Copenhagen and Berlin, with rates three times
Getting more women involved in the workforce in Central & Eastern Europe (CEE) could reap huge benefits – billions of euros – for the region’s economies and even address its labor shortages. That’s according to a report recently released by McKinsey entitled “Win-win: How empowering women can benefit Central and
A dispute between Czechia and Poland over the shut-down of a brown coal mine has turned into diplomatic spat. Media in Hungary have reported that Polish prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki decided to cancel his appearance at this week’s Demography Summit in Budapest, where his Czech counterpart Andrej Babiš is
On a visit to Poland this week, the US secretary of Energy, Jennifer Granholm, launched the Partnership for Transatlantic Energy and Climate Cooperation, emphasizing the development of nuclear power as a way for Poland and others in Central & Eastern Europe to achieve their carbon reduction targets. Granholm said that
The citizens of EU’s richest and most populous country go to the polls on September 26, and no foreign election is as important to Central Europeans as Germany’s. With Chancellor Angela Merkel set to stand down as leader of the bloc’s economic engine after 16 years, the
While most Europeans believe a new ‘Cold War’ between the United States and China and Russia has begun, they do not think their own country is involved, a new poll by the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) concludes. European citizens consider EU institutions more likely to enter a global
The high number of EU citizens from Romania stopped and questioned before entering the UK during the first half of 2021 has prompted one MEP from Romania to call for an investigation. Freedom of movement rules changed after Brexit and in the first six months of this year around 60%