President Xi Jinping attended the 2025 Global Leaders’ Meeting on Women in Beijing, and promised in the next five years, China will donate another $10m to UN Women and earmark a quota of $100m in China’s Global Development and South-South Cooperation Fund for implementing development cooperation projects for women and girls in collaboration with international organisations.

Slovakia's prime minister Robert Fico has dropped his veto on further Russia sanctions, in return for a non-committal paragraph on energy prices.

The EU Commission has lent weight to reports of Hungary's alleged spying within the EU institutions, amid jeers of "traitors" and other hate speech by populist MEPs. 

EU states are struggling with upcoming border rules that critics say could led to detention-like centres. Under the new regime authorities will have only seven days to screen a prospective asylum seeker.

Today, we kick off an anniversary campaign to convince new supporting members to join EUobserver's mission of providing the information citizens need to safeguard EU democracy.

Russian spies are still active in the EU capital and have a "higher risk appetite" than before the Ukraine war — despite Belgium's efforts to push back against their plots.