Euobserver.com

The European Commission announced on Wednesday that 20,000 students have been selected to travel across Europe in 2020. After successful previous programmes in 2018 and 2019, a total of 50,000 students have benefitted from the new DiscoverEU scheme which offers 18-year old students free train tickets to travel within the EU. For people living on islands or isolated areas a airplane ticket is foreseen.

Over 40 digital rights organisations sent a letter on Tuesday to the European Commission demanding better transparency during dialogues with stakeholders about the application of article 17 of the controversial copyright directive. The commission will develop guidelines for cooperation between platforms, rights-holders, and users. The letter calls on the institution to share the draft guidelines with participants in the dialogues and the public.

Russia's prime minister Dmitry Medvedev announced on Wednesday that he and his government are resigning, in order to give president Vladimir Putin the opportunity to implement constitutional reforms. Earlier the same day, Putin made his intentions for the constitution public during a televised speech. He wants to limit the presidency of Russia to a maximum two terms of four years, a move that would make the PM more powerful.

The far-right Identity and Democracy will overtake the Greens as the fourth-largest party in the European Parliament on 1 February, after the UK's MEPs vacate their seats.

MEPs approved on Wednesday the proposal presented in December by the European Commission on the Green Deal - with 482 votes in favour, 136 against and 95 abstentions. The Green Deal aims to achieve climate-neutrality by 2050. However, the parliament said the EU should adopt an enhanced emission-reduction target for 2030 and a new "intermediate" target for 2040.

A total of 2,000 Syrian fighters have travelled from Turkey or will arrive imminently to fight on the battlefields of Libya, the Guardian writes. Turkey sent these troops to support the Libyan UN backed government of prime minister Fayez al-Sarraj against the military attack of field marshal Khalifa Haftar on Tripoli. Russia and Turkey tried to broker a truce in Moscow on Monday, but Haftar refused to sign the deal.

At least 17 Libyans were returned to their war-torn country after attempting to flee on boats towards Europe. Their fates, along with many others, remain unknown as the EU-backed Libyan Coast Guard sweeps up people en masse.

Details have been revealed by the European Parliament of its proposals on how to conduct the two-year post-Brexit reform exercise of the EU. But a final format will have to be determined in talks with member states and the commission.

EU powers have triggered a process that could bring the world back to 2006, when sanctions and threats were all that stood in the way of a Middle East nuclear arms race.

A growing number of MEPs have become aware of the brutality and unreliability of the Vietnamese regime, and realise that this vote is one of the rare occasions in which they have binding power in EU foreign policy.

The UK concealed alerts of some 75,000 criminal convictions from national authorities in EU member states, reported The Guardian newspaper. It means EU-based authorities remained in the dark about potential offenders such as murderers and rapists. The UK had known of the error but said nothing to limit reputational damage. The latest revelation follows an EUobserver investigation into the UK abuse of an EU police database.

Ilze Juhansone was appointed to become the EU Commission's secretary-general on Tuesday, the EU executive said. The Latvian EU official has been the acting secretary-general since the departure last summer of Martin Selmayr, the previous secretary-general. Juhansone was Latvia's ambassador to the EU before she joined the commission in 2015, becoming deputy secretary-general.

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell has said the complaint against Iran filed by France, Germany and the UK is not about reimposing sanctions. Those EU states filed a complaint with the pact's joint commission, which is coordinated by Borrell. As coordinator, Borrell said the objective is "to find solutions and return to full compliance within the framework of this deal. It is not a matter of putting sanctions."

A new report from the World Economic Forum (WEF) published on Wednesday reveals that the top five global risks are all environmental: extreme weather events, failure of climate-change mitigation, human-made environmental damage, biodiversity loss and major natural disasters. "World leaders must work with all sectors of society to repair and reinvigorate our systems of cooperation for tackling our deep-rooted risks," said the WEF president, Borge Brende.

Greek government spokesperson Stelios Petsas said on Tuesday that his country wants to participate in the diplomatic initiatives concerning Libya, daily Ekathimerini reported. "Nobody can say that Greece is absent, but instead it is at the centre of developments. We want to be involved in any initiative in the search for a political solution," he said. Germany will hold a summit in Berlin on Sunday to discuss the Libyan crisis.

The EU Commission on Tuesday decided to ask the EU's top court to grant an injunction against a Polish law that would discipline judges who question the government's changes to the judiciary. "The commission decided to ask the [European] Court of Justice to impose interim measures ordering [the] Polish government to suspend the functioning of the disciplinary chamber of the Supreme Court," EU values commissioner Vera Jourova tweeted.

UK prime minister Boris Johnson has written an official letter to Scotland's first minister Nicola Sturgeon saying she should respect the 2014 promise that the independence referendum then was a "once in a generation" event. "The people of Scotland voted decisively on that promise to keep our United Kingdom together, a result which both the Scottish and UK governments committed to respect in the Edinburgh Agreement," Johnson said.

The European Committee of the Regions (CoR) welcomed on Tuesday the European Commission's financing plan for the Green Deal. But Europe's local and regional leaders warned against diverting funds from EU regional funds (cohesion policy) and centralising the new fund's governance. "The fund's governance must be consistent and avoid any centralisation towards Brussels or EU capital cities if it is to succeed," said the CoR president Karl-Heinz Lambertz.

The NGO Greenpeace said on Tuesday that EU green funding must be limited to governments committed to fossil fuel phase-out dates. "If they want the cash, the likes of Poland and the Czech Republic will have to prove they are serious about tackling the climate emergency," said climate and energy adviser Sebastian Mang, after details of the EU's Just Transition Fund for the Green Deal were published.

The European Commission unveiled on Tuesday its sustainable investment plan to put Europe on track to reach the 2050 emissions-neutrality goal - while helping coal-producing regions to move away from fossil fuels.