Iran launched its first direct attack on Israel on Sunday. Tehran fired more than 300 drones and missiles but with the help of Israel's allies 99 percent of the projectiles were neutralised, according to the Israeli armed forces. Iran had promised to retaliate after seven Revolutionary Guards were killed in Damascus on 1 April. Europe's press takes very different views of the scope and consequences of the attack.
After years of wrangling, the EU Parliament has approved a pact which tightens the regulations of the EU's common asylum system. All ten legislative proposals were adopted by a narrow majority. Under the new regulations asylum procedures will be processed on the EU's outer borders, deportation procedures accelerated and the burden on countries that take in higher numbers of migrants eased through a solidarity mechanism.
Around two hours after it kicked off, the Berlin police broke up an event on Friday that had been registered as a "Palestine Congress". The authorities justified the move by stating that one of the online speakers was banned from political activity in Germany for hate speech against Israel and Jews. According to media reports, people who were planning to attend were banned from entering the country in the run-up to the event.
The EU's General Court in Luxembourg has lifted the sanctions imposed on the Russian oligarchs Mikhail Fridman and Petr Aven between February 2022 and March 2023. It explained the decision saying that the EU Council had failed to provide sufficient evidence for the two main shareholders of Alfa-Bank to be included in the sanctions list at the time. This ruling does not, however, affect subsequent sanctions decisions.
Switzerland has announced a Ukraine peace conference for 15 June. The government in Bern said that there was sufficient international support for a high-level meeting to initiate the peace process, in response to a corresponding request by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Russia has already announced that it will not be attending. What can the initiative achieve?
The French National Assembly has unanimously agreed to ban the manufacture, import and sale of products containing PFAS from 2026 - with the exception of kitchenware such as coated pans, which were excluded from the ban due to pressure from manufacturers. PFAS stands for perfluorinated and polyfluorinated alkyl compounds. These chemicals are extremely persistent and suspected of being carcinogenic. Commentators take a critical view of the exception.
Climate protection is a human right: this was established by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) on Tuesday when it ruled that Switzerland had violated the right to protection from serious adverse effects of climate change with an inadequate climate policy. The case was brought by the association Senior Women for Climate Protection Switzerland. Commentators discuss the ruling and its potential consequences.
In Spain, around 500,000 undocumented migrants could be given the same legal status as Spanish citizens after a popular initiative was approved by an overwhelming majority in the lower house of the Spanish parliament on Tuesday. If the Senate also votes in favour, migrants who arrived before 1 November 2021 will receive residence and work permits and access to social benefits. Commentators praise the cross-party consensus.
Now it's a certainty: following the collapse of the grand coalition between the Gerb-SDS (conservative) and PP-DB (liberal, pro-European) alliances Bulgaria is headed for another snap election. This election, the sixth within three years, has been scheduled for 9 June, coinciding with the European elections. Until then an interim government under Dimitar Glavchev (Gerb) will take the helm. The national press is less than enthusiastic.
A 28-year-old woman was stabbed to death by her ex-partner outside a police station in an Athens suburb on Monday night. She had asked the police to drive her home because she felt threatened, but they told her to call the police emergency number 100 instead. When she did, she was turned down with the words "We're not a taxi service". The national press sees serious problems with the police.
In two months' time EU citizens will elect a new European Parliament. The "world's only directly elected transnational assembly", as the official election information states, will then pass laws that affect "all areas of life" in the EU. Europe's press is well aware of the significance of the elections, as a glance at the opinion sections shows.