EZ EU Economic Summit

This time, even Mutti couldn’t make everything better. For much of the past decade and a half, the EU could generally count on German Chancellor Angela Merkel to come to the rescue. But between the coronavirus pandemic, the dragged-out Brexit talks, a budget stalemate, and an array of geopolitical tensions especially in the Eastern Mediterranean, the year 2020 has turned into such a hellscape of policy problems, even Europe’s steady-handed matriarch has found herself outmatched. Many of these problems come crashing together Thursday ...

The European Union may need to hold an extra summit to secure agreement on its planned economic recovery fund and budget, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said on Tuesday. Poland and Hungary are blocking 1.8 trillion euros ($2.18 trillion) in funding because they oppose a clause linking the release of funds to the rule of law. EU leaders will try to resolve the dispute at a summit that starts on Thursday in Brussels but Morawiecki gave no sign that Budapest and Warsaw would back down. “It may happen that another summit will ...

The latest European impasse over a much-needed stimulus package has finally been overcome, meaning cash-strapped countries will soon get access to a historic level of funding. In the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, European nations agreed in July to raise 750 billion euros ($908 billion) from public markets and use that money to support the economic recovery across the 27-member region. This was a significant move and came on top of 1.074 trillion euros ($1.3 trillion) to be spent between 2021 and 2027. However, the implementation ...

This time, even Mutti couldn’t make everything better. For much of the past decade and a half, the EU could generally count on German Chancellor Angela Merkel to come to the rescue. But between the coronavirus pandemic, the dragged-out Brexit talks, a budget stalemate, and an array of geopolitical tensions especially in the Eastern Mediterranean, the year 2020 has turned into such a hellscape of policy problems, even Europe’s steady-handed matriarch has found herself outmatched. Many of these problems come crashing together Thursday ...

The European Union may need to hold an extra summit to secure agreement on its planned economic recovery fund and budget, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said on Tuesday. Poland and Hungary are blocking 1.8 trillion euros ($2.18 trillion) in funding because they oppose a clause linking the release of funds to the rule of law. EU leaders will try to resolve the dispute at a summit that starts on Thursday in Brussels but Morawiecki gave no sign that Budapest and Warsaw would back down. “It may happen that another summit will ...

German Chancellor Angela Merkel delivered a wake-up call to the European Union by saying its member countries should have acted earlier to control the coronavirus, which is now surging on the continent, according to officials familiar with her comments. Merkel, speaking to her 26 EU counterparts by video conference on Thursday, said that political realities kept them from imposing restrictions earlier, and that they would have to draw lessons from the current situation and act faster, said the officials, who asked not to be ...