Euobserver.com

Since 2018, when the EU and the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries started negotiations on the deal that would replace the Cotonou Partnership Agreement, calls for "de-colonising aid" and a strong role for local actors in development have grown.

The European Commission says its president should be treated on an equal footing with the president of the European Council. The issue came to a head over a meeting in Ankara which saw von der Leyen separated from male counterparts.

The number of people in France being treated at intensive care units (ICU) for Covid-19 is the highest in almost a year. The French health ministry on Tuesday said the number of people in ICU increased by 193 over 24 hours to 5,626 - a peak since 20 April, 2020.

Ukraine's president Volodymyr Zelensky says Nato should speed up his country's path toward membership, arguing that there is no other way to prevent further conflict in the eastern Donbass region, Deutsche Welle reports. Zelensky said his government hoped to be invited this year to join a Nato Membership Action Plan (MAP). "Nato is the only way to end the war in Donbass," he said.

The European institutions were hit by a cyber attack last week, reports Bloomberg. A European Commission spokesperson told the media outlet that it was too early to tell the origins of the attack. "Thus far, no major information breach was detected," said the spokesperson.

European Council president Charles Michel got top diplomatic seating alongside Turkey's president, leaving European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen sitting on the couch during a meeting in Ankara on Tuesday. Seating arrangements in diplomatic arenas are generally symbolic, suggesting possible power plays.

Australia has said it will ask the EU to release more than 3.1 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine - testing Brussels claim it is not blocking shipments, as the country struggles to vaccinate its population, Reuters writes. The EU denied blocking vaccine shipments to Australia, saying it was not responsible for AstraZeneca's failure to uphold commitments to other countries.

The European Commission is working on a new proposal on financing Syrian refugees in Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey. "I am very much committed to ensuring the continuity of European funding in this area ," said European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen on Tuesday. "EU funding should in the future increasingly provide better opportunities for refugees to earn their livelihoods," she added.

In a Viennese hotel, officials from Britain, France and Germany, will act as intermediaries between Iran and the US, shuttling between both delegations. Russia and China, the other parties to the 2015 nuclear pact, are also attending, Reuters reports. Tehran has repeatedly rebuffed "direct and indirect negotiations" while Washington said on Monday it expected the talks to be difficult. Neither side expected any early breakthrough.

Israel's president, Reuven Rivlin, has nominated current prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to try to form a government after the latest inconclusive election, but voiced doubt that any lawmaker could forge a parliamentary majority, The Guardian writes. The 23 March election, Israel's fourth in under two years, did not produce a clear path for any candidate to form a coalition capable of commanding a majority in the 120-member parliament.

On Tuesday Belgium launched a new website, QVAX, where people who are not yet vaccinated or have no appointment to be vaccinated, could register in case 'spare' appointments come up. Brussels will start it's own system mid-April.

The European Parliament has launched an internal probe into the conduct of Czech MEP Jan Zahradil over his dealings with China and a so-called 'friendship group'.

In Germany, there is commotion about a new book in which two journalists describe meetings held during the corona crisis between federal chancellor Angela Merkel, and the 16 prime ministers of its federal constituent states.

Italy's various mafias are allegedly exploiting the chaos caused by the Covid-19 emergency to infiltrate even deeper into sectors where they are already present, such as healthcare, mortuary services, and waste disposal (both medical and non-medical).

As a German national, I see German history as a constant warning to defend the rule of law - and to be vigilant to detect even the slightest beginnings of its erosion.

Data from hundreds of millions of Facebook users was leaked online, including personal information such as phone numbers, full names, and email addresses, Deutsche Welle writes. The leaked data from 533 million users in 106 countries was posted on an obscure hacking forum. The data is believed to be more than a year old, but security experts say the information could still be used by criminals to commit identity fraud.

European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen and Charles Michel, the president of the European Council, are in Turkey on Tuesday, meeting president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Ankara to discuss relations - which have been strained over the past year. The EU has taken a cautious approach towards Turkey over disputes dealing with energy exploration, migration, and aggressive behaviour towards Greece and Cyprus.

Preliminary results from the parliamentary election on Sunday suggest Bulgaria's incumbent prime minister Boyko Borissov will come out with a win but a weaker public mandate. His centre-right GERB party led with 26 percent of the vote, losing ground to parties on the back of corruption allegations. The populist party There is Such a People (ITN) came in second with 17.9 percent, followed by the Socialists on 15 percent.

The Saudi hajj and umrah ministry announced that three categories of people would be considered "immunised": those who have received two doses of the vaccine; those administered a single dose in the past 14 days; and people who have recovered from the virus, The Guardian writes. Unlike hajj, the shorter umrah pilgrimage is non-compulsory and can be performed at any time of year.

French energy firm Total has justified ongoing operations in Myanmar despite its massacre of civilians, by saying a shutdown would lead to forced labour or electricity blackouts. "Can we halt production of this gas that supplies electricity to a large population ... adding to their suffering?", Total CEO Patrick Pouyanne said Sunday. He was "appalled by the repressive action", Pouyanne added, after opposition leaders urged Total to pull the plug.