Foreign Policy Blogs

Europe

Five Questions: European Union Ambassador to the United Nations Fernando Valenzuela

The Foreign Policy Association and the European Courier spoke with the Head of the Delegation of the European Commission to the United Nations, Ambassador Fernando Valenzuela of Spain, about issues impacting the EU at the UN.  Watch the video below or read the transcript here. [kml_flashembed movie=”http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=20973086853862567″ width=”400″ height=”326″ wmode=”transparent” /]

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Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday!

The European Parliament rang in its 50th anniversary today, with a 'solemn ceremony’, in what FT commentator Andrew Bounds calls “an even more surreal session” in Strasbourg than usual. Since 1958 and with the growth of the Union the legitimacy (first appointed then directly elected), size (from 142 members to the current 785) and role […]

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Musical chairs

Musical chairs

 Commentators are speculating about the end of the Barroso Commission as we know it. It seems as if he resignation of EU health Commissioner Markos Kyprianou to take up the post as Cyprus’ Foreign Minister two weeks ago was only the beginning. Effective March 14 one of the arguably most successful Commissioners, internal policy head […]

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Elections a-go-go

Elections a-go-go

Europeans took to the polls over the weekend, with perhaps unsurprising results: Spain's socialist Prime Minister Zapatero was reelected against a bland looking Mariano Rajoy, despite an economic crisis that still has to fully play out and France's governing UMP was given a shake-up in communal elections, serving as a warning sign that the electorate is […]

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Superhero Economics

Superhero Economics

You might think you are reading the synopsis of a comic book, for all the talk of ‘heroes’ and ‘villains’, but instead it's just the newest edition of the Centre for European Reform's (CER) Lisbon Scorecard. Published with smooth regularity ahead of the Union's annual Spring Summit for the eighth consecutive year the report highlights the most […]

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Serbian Ambassador to UN on Kosovo's Independence

The FPA recently spoke to Serbia's Ambassador to the United Nations, Pavle Jevremovic, on Kosovo's declaration of independence.  Jevremovic discusses the impact the reaction by Serbia might have on negotiations for his country's EU membership bid, as well as the role of Russia and the U.S. [kml_flashembed movie=”http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=-7159138757623185243″ width=”400″ height=”326″ wmode=”transparent” /]

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Bye, bye bureaucracy

Bye, bye bureaucracy

Cutting red tape is just one of the avowed goals of the Barroso Commission. A high-level expert group including the former Bavarian state governor, Edmund Stoiber, and international management consulting guru Roland Berger has been given the mandate to examine how to most effectively reduce bureaucratic hurdles and enhance the functioning of the internal market. […]

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Whither the Mediterranean Union?

Whither the Mediterranean Union?

 Update (March 4, 2008) Der Spiegel is reporting that the “cold snap” between the Franco-German partners is thawing, following a “constructive” meeting in which President Sarkozy agreed to a compromise to extend negotiations on a future Mediterranean Union to all 27 EU Member States, not just bordering countries. Quoting the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung the Spiegel […]

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Welcome to Europe!

Welcome to Europe!

The European Union , 27 Member States, 492 million consumers, a single market and the greatest free trading zone in the world, with open borders in 18 of its Member States. Only 53 years after the end of one of the most atrocious wars in history, the European Union has not only created tenable peace […]

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