Новости за 08.05.2020

Russia wants more respect for its role in defeating the Nazis in World War 2, its EU ambassador, Vladimir Chizhov, says in an op-ed.

70 years later, after decades of comparative peace, todays European Union - perhaps the world's greatest experiment in state integration - finds itself at a crossroads.

The EU's top court, the European Court of Justice, warned Friday the bloc's legal order could unravel if national courts started to question the primacy of EU law and ECJ decisions. In an unprecedented statement, after the German Constitutional Court's ruling on the European Central Bank diverging from an earlier ECJ decision, the ECJ said it alone has the right to rule on EU institutions and interpret EU law.

Estonia is marking 75 years since the end of WW2 on European soil on Friday at a vide-meeting of the UN Security Council, which it currently chairs. The event, which is public and live-streamed, will discuss "lessons learned to prevent future atrocities" and "the responsibility of the Security Council", which has failed to stop egregious war crimes in Syria in recent times. US historian Timothy Snyder will also take part.

Worldwide, there are now 3.86m people confirmed to be infected by the coronavirus, of which 1.22m have officially recovered, Reuters reports. The total number of deaths stands at 268,554. The United States counts for the highest number of cases - 1.26m. Per capita, Qatar has the highest number of cases: 667 cases per 100,000 people. Belgium has the highest number of deaths: 71.

Polish ruling party chairman Jarosław Kaczyński is trying to turn the country into a Roman Catholic dictatorship, Poland's former foreign minister has said.

A plan to relocate, from Greece, 1,600 unaccompanied minors seeking asylum to other member states have so far netted 59 transfers. Twelve minors have been sent to Luxembourg and 47 to Germany. The European Commission says Portugal and Slovenia are next to take some in. They hope to relocate the remaining minors over the next few months.

MEPs said the Czech PM should fully resolve the possible conflict of interest in a company that receives EU funds - or resign.

Such claims, based on internal reports four years ago, fall far from the truth, and are mainly based on conjectures and presumptions. The so-called 'Chinese espionage menace' is nothing new and has time and again been proven fictitious.

Support services for victims and witnesses, the police and other relevant authorities are stretched to the limits because of staff shortages, travel restrictions or other demands related to Covid-19.

The European Commission is floating plans to beef up the fight against money-laundering, including possibly giving a supervisor role to the European Banking Authority. Yet the authority's board refused to act on a €200bn money-laundering scandal involving Danske Bank.

The EU's foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell called agreeing to Chinese censorship on the origins of coronavirus "misguided". Nevertheless, he said diplomacy works like that in China.

"The coronavirus has ending blowing up the model of global multilateral governance that has been functioning over the past few years," EU foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell told a group of reporters on Thursday.

For the second time in a week, journalists in Berlin have been attacked by anti-lockdown protesters, Deutsche Welle reports. Each time a TV crew with camera were attacked when they approached a group of people protesting against measures to contain the coronavirus. Germany's foreign minister Heiko Maas condemned the attacks, saying on Twitter "those who attack journalists also attack our democracy."

Prime minister Edouard Philippe said on Thursday that France does not rule out of re-imposing a lockdown if coronavirus cases increase, Reuters reported. "We have always said that we would rather not have to, if possible, resort [to a new lockdown] but also that, in the event that there was no other option, we would not rule it out," Philippe said. French lockdown will be partially lifted on Monday.

Belgium's supermarkets have seen an increase in takings of more than €500m since the lockdown was installed mid-March, Le Soir writes. Compared to last year that is an increase of 10 percent. The uptick in sale was mainly for alcohol, food and cleaning products. At the beginning of the lockdown, people massively over-bought toilet paper and frozen foods, but those sales are today back to normal.

EU home affairs commissioner Ylva Johansson told MEPs that "the demand for child sexual abuse material has increased by up to 30 percent in some member states." Her comments were among a number of examples of criminal behavoir that has erupted since the pandemic outbreak. She said criminals also tried to cheat authorities out of €50m by selling them non-existent face masks.