Euobserver.com

Relations improved between Greece and Turkey at a high-level meeting in Athens on Monday, but the EU remains wary of Ankara.

Czech police have recommended charging prime minister Andrej Babiš with fraud, after an investigation into whether he misused EU funds. Prosecutors now have to decide whether to file charges. The police recommended indictment two years ago, but then the prosecutor dropped the case. Babiš denies wrongdoing. The EU Commission recently published a report saying Babiš has conflicts of interest over EU subsidies involving his former business conglomerate.

The World Health Organization (WHO) faces reforms aimed at preventing potential future pandemics, Reuters reported. Health ministers from the WHO's 194 member states will meet in November to decide whether to launch negotiations on an international treaty aimed at improving preparedness against any future outbreak. The proposal, put forward by the EU, is supported by a majority of WHO members, an EU official said.

Like-minded "illiberals" in the European Parliament's far-right Independence & Democracy (ID), anti-federalist European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR), and centre-right European People's Party (EPP) groups should form a new alliance, Italy's populist former interior minister Matteo Salvini said Sunday. But Italian politician Antonio Tajani, a former EU parliament president from the EPP, immediately poured cold water on Salvini's idea, saying: "For the EPP, it's impossible to make an agreement with ID".

The far-right Israeli politician Naftali Bennett will be the country's next prime minister under a proposed power-sharing deal intended to oust Benjamin Netanyahu, the head of the opposition, Yair Lapid has confirmed, The Guardian writes. In his speech and for the first time, Lapid referred to Bennett, a far-right religious nationalist and strong advocate for the settler movement in the Palestinian territories, as the "intended prime minister".

French special forces shot and apprehended a renegade soldier, Terry Dupin, in a forest in south-western France on Monday 24 hours after he went on the run with a high-calibre weapon following a wild argument with his girlfriend. But Belgian police are still searching for a runaway soldier, Jürgen Conings, with extreme-right views, who has managed to evade capture for two weeks after stealing weapons and threatening a terrorist attack.

Belgium will donate four million additional Covid-19 vaccines to COVAX, the worldwide effort started by the World Health Organization to make jabs available to all countries. From July, Belgium will be offering its surplus Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca vaccines, development minister Meryame Kitir said on Monday. In Belgium, both the AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson doses have been limited to people aged over 41.

The European Commission has updated the common approach to travel measures in the EU, urging member states to gradually lift restrictions - in a bid to end a current patchwork of rules across the bloc.

Margrethe Vestager was interior and deputy prime minister during the reported US-led Danish spying scandal of top European allies. But her office points out that Danish intelligence services are overseen by its ministry of defence and justice.

The EU is the most important market for Norwegian goods, from salmon to natural gas. But after Norway's election in September, Oslo may get a government where the majority oppose the current European Economic Area agreement.

In Hungary, a proposed amendment of the housing law insists municipalities sell their housing units to inhabitants at 10-30 percent of the market price, a decision that would "further deepen the current urban housing crisis and increase existing housing inequalities".

The Renew Europe family launches on Tuesday (1 June) a series of monthly 'Values Talks', with the participation of Renew Europe president Dacian Cioloș and one of the leading politicians of the liberal, pro-European family, Estonian prime minister Kaja Kallas.

The European Commission announced on Monday that its press room will reopen to journalists on 1 July, when teleworking will not longer be mandatory in Belgium. The midday briefing will work on a "first come, first served" basis, while other briefings will require seat reservation. There will be about 70 seats available. The online system will remain in place. The press room has been closed since 13 March 2020.

Turkish foreign minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu prompted Greek rebukes after visiting the Thrace region in Greece on Sunday, where he met Muslim leaders, and spoke of a "Turkish" ethnic "minority" there. "Turkey's constant attempts to distort this reality, as well as the allegations of alleged non-protection of the rights of these citizens ... are rejected," the Greek foreign ministry, which considers the Thrace minority a religious not an ethnic group, said.

Denmark's Defence Intelligence Service helped the US National Security Agency (NSA) to get phone details of top French, German, Norwegian, and Swedish officials by giving it access to Danish internet cables, Danmarks Radio revealed Sunday. The 2012-2014 NSA operation targeted German chancellor Angela Merkel and then foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier. US whistleblower Edward Snowden also said, in 2013, that the NSA had tapped Merkel's telephone.

More than 1,000 people protested against mask-wearing and vaccines in Brussels Saturday. Some in the same crowd also came out in support of Jürgen Conings, an extreme-right Belgian soldier who went on the run after threatening an attack. The crowd first gathered near the Bois de la Cambre park, then marched toward EU institutions. Things remained mostly calm, but police dispersed demonstrators by firing tear gas near the Schuman roundabout.

Ireland will end 14-day quarantines for British, EU, and US visitors from 19 July and reopen bar and restaurant interiors from 5 July, easing one of the strictest lockdown regimes in Europe, it said Friday. Restaurants will also reopen in the Netherlands on 5 June, as will museums, theatres, and cinemas. "This is actually the end of the lockdown," Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte said at the weekend.

"Radical Islamism in Mali with our soldiers there? Never," French president Emmanuel Macron told the Journal du Dimanche newspaper. "There is this temptation today in Mali. But if it goes in that direction, I will withdraw," he said on Sunday, speaking after another recent coup in Bamako. Mali is at the heart of France's anti-jihadist Sahel operation, which involves 5,000 troops also in Burkina Faso, Chad, Mauritania, and Niger.

Elem, a Cypriot far-right party affiliated with the now-illegal neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party in Greece, doubled its share of the vote in Cyprus elections on Sunday. The ruling centre-right Dysi party and left-wing opposition Akel parties came top, with 28 percent and 22 percent, respectively. But Elem came fourth with 6.8 percent in an election dominated by government corruption scandals and xenophobia over increasing numbers of migrant arrivals.

A group of member states is seeking to prolong EU funding for cross-border natural gas projects - contrary to the European Commission's plans to remove all support for such infrastructure, according to a draft document seen by EUobserver.