Новости за 06.01.2017

The former Belgian PM is counting on support from smaller groups and on antipathy toward centre-right candidate Antonio Tajani.

Poland is entering a period of rule by PiS decree, with street protests, foreign pressure, and regime infighting left as the only hopes for rule of law writes Maciej Kisilowski.

Over 7,600 asylum claims were registered in Greece last November. The figure is almost seven times more than the monthly average in 2015.

Austria's defence minister is proposing a radical overhaul of the EU asylum rules, including offshoring the asylum process and imposing limits on EU state intakes.

The planet is heating up faster than ever and reaching temperatures almost 1.5 degrees Celsius higher than in the 1750s, an EU earth observatory has warned.

Ulrike Lunacek, a vice-president of the European Parliament, said on Thursday that the arrest of former Kosovo PM Ramush Haradinaj in France on Wednesday, under a Serbian warrant from 2004, was "totally unacceptable". The Green Austrian MEP called on the EU to "find clear words towards Serbia that outdated arrest warrants like these need to be withdrawn."

The head of the Brexit ministry in London "vigorously opposed" the appointment of Tim Barrow as new British EU ambassador on Wednesday, according to the Financial Times. The newspaper says that Olly Robbins, permanent secretary at the Department for Exiting the EU, tried to downgrade the job to make it answerable to him. Barrow was named to replace Ivan Rogers, who resigned criticising the government's lack of strategy.

Some 73 percent of Germans say they feel safe in their country, according to a poll published by ARD public television on Thursday, two weeks after a Berlin Christmas market was attacked. While 88 percent say thay have "a lot of trust" in the police, only 36 percent say the same about intelligence services. Fifty-six percent say they are "satisfied with the work" of chancellor Angela Merkel.

Diesel cars in the EU pollute ten times more than Diesel lorries and buses, according to a study by the International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT). The US association, which revealed the Volkswagen scandal in 2015, found that "on an engine-load basis, heavy-duty diesel vehicles are roughly ten times better than light-duty diesels at reducing NOx [Nitrogen oxides] emissions," even after emission standards were tightened by the EU.

Racist remarks and a dodgy plane trip make German commissioner unfit to be an ethics chief, MEPs have said, amid a broader popularity crisis for EU officials.