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EU leaders agreed that about a third of the €750bn recovery package and the €1.074 trillion seven-year budget will be invested in projects contributing to climate action. However, environmental activists said that the package falls short on climate safeguards.

Northern European countries kept insisting on "no democracy, no money". Initially, this looked right. But the Portuguese prime minister António Costa, who lived under dictatorship, is not convinced.

France's foreign minister Jean-Yves Le Drian on Tuesday condemned the treatment of Uighurs in China and said Paris wanted independent observers in the area, Reuters reported. "All of the practices in the area are unacceptable because they go against all the global human rights conventions and we condemn them strongly," he said. France was asking China to allow international independent observers and the human rghts high commissioner into the region.

The middleman in the murder of investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia has been found stabbed only hours ahead of a court hearing in Malta. Police suggest Melvin Theuma, who acted as a go-between in the car bombing that killed Galizia, had committed self-harm, according to local media reports. Theuma had been granted a pardon in November. His evidence implicated alleged mastermind behind the murder, tycoon Yorgen Fenech.

France's parliament passed the final vote on Tuesday on a new law to protect victims of domestic violence. It allows doctors to break patient confidentiality if life is "in immediate danger", and allows for parental rights to be suspended. The law also increases prison sentences to 10 years for perpetrators whose actions led to suicide or attempted suicide. Last year, 149 women died of domestic violence in France.

Italian senator Gianluigi Paragone will launch a new party later this week called "Italexit", after first meeting the UK's Nigel Farage, who helped steer Britain out of the European Union. "We can no longer be blackmailed by countries that offend the great prestige of Italy," said Paragone, who once belonged to the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement. Polls in May showed most Italians do not trust the EU.

Coronavirus cases in Spain have increased rapidly, according to the latest figures from the Spanish health ministry. Covid-19 cases are now 27.39 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, a sharp rise from the 8.76 cases per 100,000 reported on July 3. Since the end of June cases have increased, with a sharp spike last week concentrated in the Aragon, Catalonia regions and the Basque country.

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Green NGOs urge the EU Commission to align its reform of the Common Agriculture Policy with the ambitions set in the EU Green Deal. The commission wants member states to reach an agreement.

In contrast to campaign posters on the street or ads on TV, other voters have no way of knowing what paid political messaging their fellow citizens are seeing. People become siphoned off from each other and societal divides might harden.

After gruelling five-day talks, EU leaders agreed on €390bn in grants and €360bn in low-interest loans to hardest-hit member states - after much opposition from the Dutch-led 'frugal' bloc of countries.

EU leaders on Monday evening were expected to return to the negotiating table on the fourth day of their marathon negotiations over the nearly €1.1 trillion seven-year budget and the recovery package. European Council president Charles Michel was expected to present a new proposal hoping to bridge the gap between opposing sides."I think that even if difficult, [...] I am convinced that an agreement is possible," he said Monday.

EU leaders resume their summit over the long-term budget and recovery fund, after a fruitless weekend of meetings in Brussels. Meanwhile, the European Commission is to present a new security strategy for the EU plus several action plans.

After bilateral negotiations continued all Sunday night, mostly to try to convince the 'Frugal Four' to move their red lines, European Council president Charles Michel is expected to table a new proposal on Monday afternoon with €390bn in grants.

AFP reports Italy will put the captain of an Italian-flagged vessel on trial for allegedly pushing back migrants to Libya. The Asso 28 supply ship in July 2018 picked up 101 migrants in international waters and returned them to Libya's capital city Tripoli. Libya is not considered a safe port under international law. The push-back case marks a first in Italy.

Authorities in Spain have demanded some 100,000 people in Catalonia remain at home amid a spike in Covid-19 infections. The north-eastern region is one of the worst-hit in Spain. A government statement issued on Sunday demanded people living in Figueres and Vilafant, in the province of Girona, and Sant Feliu de Llobregat, near Barcelona, to stay at home. The region's department of health on Saturday recorded another 1,226 cases.

Turkey's president Recep Tayyip Erdogan visited the Hagia Sophia over the weekend, just days before the first Islamic prayers are to be held in the former museum now turned into a mosque. Tourists and visitors are still allowed into the mosque when prayers are not taking place. Christian mosaics and other relics will be curtained off during the prayers.

Germany has for the past 30 years violated arm exports rules, according to a study by the Peace Research Institute Frankfurt (Prif). "Germany licenses and exports weapons of war and armaments to countries affected by war and crisis, to countries with human rights violations and to regions of tension," said Prif. The study says Germany systematically breached EU criteria when it comes to arms exports.

Four states in southern Germany have appealed to the US congress not to withdraw American troops. The request follows promises by US president Donald Trump to cut the number of US troops in Germany by 9,500, to 25,000. The troops are based in Bavaria, Hesse, Baden-Wuerttemberg and Rhineland-Palatinate. In their letter, all four states demanded the US congress "secure the US presence in Germany and Europe in the future."

Poland is planning new rules limiting the concentration of foreign-owned media outlets well before the ruling nationalist party finish its term in power, Poland's de facto leader said on Sunday. Poland's ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party has long accused foreign-owned media outlets of meddling in Poland's affairs. Party leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski said he hopes the reforms will be carried out soon, Reuters reported. The next elections are in 2023.