Ukraine’s EU ‘U-turn’ dominates East Europe talks

"The Eastern Partnership Summit between EU and Eastern European leaders starts Thursday in Vilnius in the shadow of Ukraine’s decision to scrap a key trade deal with the EU following pressure from Moscow.

Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych has nonetheless said that he will attend the meeting. “Yanukovych said that he wanted to come and explain himself to his European counterparts, but the real reason is that the negotiations here in Vilnius are still going on right up until the last minute,” said FRANCE 24’s Gulliver Cragg in the Lithuanian capital. 

While the Ukrainian government has admitted to pulling out of the deal with the EU after pressure from Russia, diplomats were still discussing possible concessions on Wednesday. On the fourth day of mass pro-European street protests in Kiev, the Ukrainian prime minister said his government still wanted to strike an agreement with the EU.

“The document is physically on the table here in Vilnius,” Cragg said. “But Yanukovych’s main purpose here will be to convince the EU to have three-way talks with Russia.” He added that European officials were divided on the prospect of negotiations with Russian President Vladimir Putin’s government over their competing spheres of influence in Eastern Europe.

From Moscow, Guardian correspondent Shaun Walker told FRANCE 24 that a deal with Ukraine was unlikely this week but that this may be only a temporary delay. “Eventually they do want European integration, but it’s just not the right economic decision for them right now,” he said. Ukraine is heavily dependent on Russia for trade and energy supplies, and the EU’s offer appears to have been insufficient to counter Moscow’s threats of commercial retaliation.

Although Ukraine is the largest and most visible of the six countries engaged in the much-lauded EU Eastern partnership, Walker said it was not the first time Europe’s efforts to develop ties in the region have been thwarted by Russia.

“Armenia was another country – all the paperwork was ready to sign on the dotted line. A couple of months ago Vladimir Putin travelled there and the next day, Armenia announced it wasn’t joining this EU partnership – that it was in fact joining Russia’s EU-style Customs Union,” he said.

Walker and Cragg both argue that the European Union’s image and diplomatic clout have suffered in the Ukrainian rapprochement fiasco – at least in the short term. However, two other former members of the Soviet bloc, Georgia and Moldova, are due to sign free trade agreements with the EU in Vilnius. Russia’s deputy prime minister has already warned that it will apply pressure to these countries as well."

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The European Union Wants To Join The Drone Club

Seven EU countries said they would form a club to produce military drones. The European project would join drones made by the U.S., Israel and more recently China.
Seven EU countries say they want to join forces and start making their own military drones by 2020 rather than relying on the Americans. The EU Observer website reported that the proposed "Medium Altitude Long Endurance (Male) craft ... can be used to strike military targets or for surveillance of migrant boats in the Mediterranean Sea."
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Elfogadta az EP az unió költségvetését

Elfogadta az Európai Unió 2014 és 2020 közötti hétéves periódusra vonatkozó keretköltségvetését kedden délben az Európai Parlament (EP).

Az állam- és kormányfők által februárban jóváhagyott keretköltségvetés (multi-annual financial framework - MFF) részleteiről hónapokon át tartó egyeztetés folyt az EP és a tagállamok szakminisztereit tömörítő tanács képviselői között.

A 2011-es árakon hét év alatt 960 milliárd euró uniós kötelezettségvállalást és 908 milliárd euró kifizetést lehetővé tevő keretköltségvetést 537 EP-képviselő támogatta, 126-an szavaztak ellene és 19-en tartózkodtak.

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Eurozone posts solid trade surplus for September

The 17-nation eurozone posted a $17.7 billion trade surplus in goods in September, the European Commission's data office Eurostat said Monday.

The surplus, posted as a first estimate, was significantly higher than the $9.3 billion surplus posted in August and the $11.6 billion posted in September 2012. From August, exports rose 1 percent, while imports fell 0.3 percent, Eurostat said.

In the 28-member European Union, the trade balance for the month came to $800 million, which compares to a $19.6 billion deficit from September 2012.

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E.U. Predicts Anemic Growth and High Unemployment in 2014

A fragile recovery across the European Union is not expected to bear fruit until next year. And unemployment is likely to remain high in countries like Greece and Spain, and even rise in France, the Union’s head of economic policy warned Tuesday.

Left-leaning lawmakers in the European Parliament immediately branded the autumn economic forecast by Olli Rehn, the European Union’s commissioner for economics and monetary affairs, as evidence that the bloc’s austerity policies were continuing to inflict unnecessary pain on millions of Europeans.

And some analysts warned that the forecasts might even be too optimistic in parts, saying that investors and business were likely to remain jittery about growth in many countries and that Europe could even face a sustained period of deflation — an affliction in which economic demand is so weak that prices actually decline, potentially making government debt reduction all the harder.

The report could increase pressure on the European Central Bank to take action to stimulate the economy when it meets on Thursday. Last week, official figures showed inflation falling to an annual rate of just 0.7 percent, well below the E.C.B.'s official target of about 2 percent.

Mr. Rehn’s forecasts could bolster those members of the E.C.B.'s Governing Council who argue that action is needed to prevent the euro zone from becoming stuck in the same kind of economic stagnation that afflicted Japan for decades.

At a news conference Tuesday, Mr. Rehn said the risk of deflation was remote, but he declined to comment on whether the E.C.B. should lower interest rates.

Mr. Rehn said economic output for all of 2013 among the 17 countries that use the euro currency was expected shrink by 0.4 percent, but would grow by 1.1 percent next year. He also said that the 28 countries of the European Union would have an average of zero growth this year, but were expected to grow by 1.4 percent in 2014.

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