European Union

The political landscape in Kosovo appears to be undergoing rapid change after Sunday's parliamentary elections. The coalition of former UÇK rebels lost ten percentage points and leads only by a narrow margin, not large enough for a governing majority. Support for the left-nationalist party Vetevendosje, by contrast, doubled and it is now the second-strongest party. What do these results mean for the country and the Balkans?

A scandal occurred during a ceremony commemorating the victims of an SS massacre in the Greek village of Distomo: as the German ambassador was about to lay a wreath at the memorial, former parliamentary speaker Zoi Konstantopoulou confronted him and demanded that Germany pay war reparations. Manolis Glezos, a 94-year-old resistance fighter, took the ambassador by the hand and helped him to lay down the wreath, saying that the children of the perpetrators were not responsible for their parents' crimes. Greece's press is divided over the incident.

Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic are facing EU infringement procedures. Under a quota system agreed in 2015 the other member states are supposed to take in 120,000 asylum seekers from Italy and Greece by September 2017. So far Poland and Hungary haven't taken in a single refugee and the Czech Republic has only taken in twelve. Given these figures the states shouldn't complain about sanctions now, commentators point out.

The government crisis in Finland is over for the time being. Prime Minister Juha Sipilä had announced that he was no longer willing to govern together with the Finns Party because under its new leader new Jussi Halla-aho the party threatened to shift even further to the right. Now, however, 20 of the party's MPs have split off and formed their own new parliamentary group called New Alternative in a bid to continue the coalition. Does this leave the government in a stable position?

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Whilst practical cooperation between the EU and Iran already exists, the scope is currently well below potential. The limits of our cooperation reflect ongoing concerns in the EU and international community, chiefly connected to Iran’s nuclear programme. The EU is also following the situation of human rights closely.

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The Gibraltar Betting and Gaming Association Limited and The Queen
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The principle of freedom to provide services guaranteed by EU law does not apply between Gibraltar and the UK