Auditors raise alarm on EU Commission use of consultants

Poland in 2020 imposed a near-total ban on abortion, triggering mass protests — and today the demands for access to safe abortion continue. On International Safe Abortion Day, dozens gathered in Brussels calling for solidarity among member states.

Vasco Alves Cordeiro, president of the European Committee of the Regions, is advocating a revamp of the EU's regional policy so that it better supports all regions in addressing major challenges such as the green and digital transitions.

Germany has announced an increase in police checks on its border with Poland and the Czech Republic — in a bid to respond to irregular migration along smuggling routes.

Emily O'Reilly cited the post-pandemic recovery funds, the windfall taxes on energy companies, and the joint purchase of vaccines, as procedures which received limited scrutiny from the national parliaments — as a result of emergency decision-making powers that bypassed parliament.

The EU Commission's new magic formula for avoiding scrutiny is simple. You declare the documents in question to be "short-lived correspondence for a preliminary exchange of views" and thus exempt them from being logged in the official inventory.

Political parties facing multiple corruption charges are hoping for a grand comeback at Saturday's snap elections in Slovakia —which could also lead to a reversal of the central European country's position on Ukraine and Russia.