Eurotopics.net

EU Council President Charles Michel has caused a stir at a conference in Slovenia by saying that the EU must set itself the goal of taking in new members by 2030. This would require rapid reforms in the candidate countries, but also in the EU and its decision-making processes, he stressed. Commentators are at odds about how realistic - or desirable - this goal is.

Farewell in a very small circle: while Russia was still debating what honours Yevgeny Prigozhin, who was once given a "Hero of Russia" award, should receive, and whether Putin himself would attend his funeral, the Wagner boss killed in a mysterious plane crash has been buried in a small cemetery in St. Petersburg. Europe's press comments.

Two people died and 58 people were injured in several explosions at a liquid petroleum gas (LPG) filling station in the town of Crevedia, near Bucharest, on Saturday. Fire inspectors had already informed the authorities about serious problems at the site in 2020. The station's operating licence had been withdrawn, but it was never shut down. Another case of lethal Romanian corruption, says the national press.

The Dutch company Pluralis, owned by US investor George Soros's Soros Economic Development Fund, has acquired a majority stake in Gremi Media, which publishes the second largest Polish daily, Rzeczpospolita. There had been growing speculation about a sale in recent years, with a Polish state-owned company among the interested parties. The news elicits a divided reaction in the press.

Drugs like hashish and LSD have been openly traded for decades on Pusher Street in Freetown Christiania, the hippy enclave in Copenhagen founded by squatters and anarchists in 1971 and tolerated by the city as an autonomous community. Weapons and hard drugs are forbidden, but for some time now residents have had problems with criminal gangs, and matters came to a head last weekend after a man was shot dead and four other people injured.