The relief over the green light from Washington for billions in new aid to Ukraine is likely to be great when the EU foreign and defense ministers meet today. That is good because, without the Americans, Ukraine would probably be lost. However, the $60 billion aid package from the USA does not mean that the Europeans are off the hook. The Jumbo Council in Luxembourg will focus on what the EU states can now do additionally.
There is positive news from Europe. “I expect new announcements for air defense capabilities for Ukraine soon,” said NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg on Friday after a crisis meeting. Two or three countries will likely follow Germany’s example in the next few days and provide Ukraine with additional air defense systems. Prime Minister Mark Rutte has signaled that the Netherlands could also hand over Patriots and buy additional systems from other countries. In addition to the Patriots, the French-Italian Aster SAMP/T air defense system could also be involved. Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba, who will be in Luxembourg today via video call together with Defense Minister Rustem Umjerow, has put the requirement at a minimum of seven systems.
Over lunch, the foreign and defense ministers will continue the discussion on new Iran sanctions from the summit. Annalena Baerbock and State Secretary Siemtje Möller will be arriving from Berlin. One or two ministers are likely to criticize why the services of EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell are taking so long to prepare the basis for a decision. The plan is to add missiles to the sanctions regime against drones and to extend it geographically to Iran’s proxies from Lebanon and Yemen to Iraq and Syria. Legal texts will not yet be available. Ideally, a political agreement will be reached, but even this is reportedly not guaranteed.
From agricultural policy to industrial and sustainability policy – the list of votes in the last week of the parliamentary session is long. However, there are also dossiers on the agenda that will need further negotiations in the new legislature.
Approval of the Commission’s discharge proposals is considered relatively certain. An expert opinion from the Legal Affairs Committee in Parliament, requested by the Environment Committee, does not stand in the way of this: the service has no legal objections. It will be interesting to see whether amendments get through. If so, the member states would have to accept them word for word so that they can be adopted before the elections. The most likely scenario, however, is that the plenary session agrees without amendments and the dossier is adopted in time for the election campaign.
The issue is controversial, but Parliament is nevertheless likely to approve the trilogue agreement because it is the last chance to extend trade facilitation for Ukraine. Parliament’s demand to also adopt safeguard measures for grain is not part of the agreement. Elsewhere, however, protective measures for agricultural products were extended once again at the insistence of several member states. This should make it easier for critics of free trade – especially agricultural politicians and MPs from countries bordering Ukraine – to agree.
Parliament adopted its negotiating position in January. The position is intended to be finalized with a new vote and would therefore no longer need to be confirmed after the EU elections. It can be assumed that this will succeed. There is still no agreement in sight on the part of the member states.
On Monday, Parliament will vote on the trilogue result on the right to repair. A large majority is expected. The Member States must then also adopt the result. This is scheduled for May 15 in the Committee of Permanent Representatives (Coreper); on May 23, the consumer protection ministers will then vote in the Competitiveness Council.
After long negotiations in the Council and most recently between the Council and Parliament, the Parliament must now vote on the negotiated trilogue result. The EPP, Renew and a majority of the Social Democrats will probably vote in favor of the compromise on the new European debt rules. The left-wing group and the Greens will reject them, as the spending cuts in the Member States triggered by the rules could hit green investments. The two right-wing groups will also say no. It is currently expected that a majority will vote in favor, but the margin will not be large.
The EU wants to reduce the release of microplastics into the environment by 30 percent by 2030. The legislative proposal presented by the EU Commission in October is also intended to contribute to this. According to the proposal, all players who handle plastic pellets will be subject to obligations. In detail: to avoid losses, to draw up risk assessment plans and to remedy damage in the event of a loss. The Environment Committee adopted its report in March and the plenary will vote on it on Tuesday. Negotiations with the Council will then begin in the fall at the earliest.
In future, products manufactured using forced labor will no longer be made available on the EU internal market, sold or exported from there. The EU Parliament and Council agreed on the new regulation at the beginning of March. The Council already adopted the result in mid-March. The Parliament is expected to vote on Tuesday.
The trilogue agreement on the Supply Chain Directive, the adoption of which has been on hold in the Council for several weeks, must now also be formally approved by Parliament. This is scheduled for Wednesday afternoon. The member states have once again significantly toned down the outcome of the negotiations, for example, by reducing the scope of application and deleting the risk sectors.
On Wednesday afternoon, MEPs will also vote on the trilogue result from the beginning of March. The provisional agreement aims to make packaging on the EU internal market safer and more sustainable. For example, all packaging should be recyclable by 2030. It is unlikely that two amendments tabled by Andreas Glück (FDP) shortly before the deadline will be adopted. Glück wants to remove certain reusable targets for packaging used by companies to transport products between their own sites and within a Member State. In the Council, the Permanent Representatives Committee (Coreper) had already adopted the result of the trilogue negotiations before Easter.
The Council and Parliament already agreed on a joint legislative text in December. Coreper confirmed the agreement shortly afterward. MEPs must now formally adopt the result, according to the agenda next Thursday at noon. The regulation expands the previous Ecodesign Directive, extends its scope to almost all products and provides for a ban on unsold clothing, shoes and accessories.
It is expected that there will be a majority in Parliament for the political agreement reached in February. It provides for the limit values for many air pollutants to be aligned with the WHO guideline values by 2030. This would tighten the limit values significantly. It is expected that the limit values for nitrogen oxides and particulate matter in particular will be exceeded at numerous measuring stations, making driving bans and production bans for industrial plants necessary.
The trilogue agreement on the Net-Zero Industry Act should pass the plenary session on Thursday quite smoothly. At the end of February, the Industry Committee had already approved the text, which the European Parliament and member states had negotiated within a year. The NZIA is intended to facilitate the establishment of factories for climate-friendly technologies such as wind power or heat pumps.
The Gigabit Infrastructure Act aims to accelerate the expansion of high-performance communication infrastructure – fiber optics and 5G – across Europe. The new regulation replaces the directive on reducing broadband costs from 2014. Among other things, the Parliament and Council agreed in February to simplify approval procedures, remove bureaucratic hurdles and introduce the principle of tacit approval. This means that infrastructure projects are automatically deemed to have been approved if the authorities do not approve them within four months. Parliament has also ensured that roaming charges will be abolished in the EU from 2029. vis
In March, the Council and Parliament agreed on the Cyber Solidarity Act, which aims to make the Union more resilient and responsive to cyber threats. The regulation aims to strengthen the Union’s capacity to detect, prevent and respond to cybersecurity threats and incidents. An amendment to the 2019 Cybersecurity Act on managed security services is also intended to improve cyber resilience. At the same time, the EU is strengthening its cooperation mechanisms. The regulation also provides for the creation of a cyber emergency mechanism. vis
In January, the Commission presented a package of measures to support European start-ups and SMEs in the development of trustworthy artificial intelligence. This includes an amendment to the EuroHPC Regulation with regard to the establishment of AI factories, which will become a new area of activity of the EU High Performance Computing Joint Undertaking (EuroHPC). It also includes financial support in this area from existing programs. vis
The Late Payment Regulation is one of the voting texts that will have to be dealt with further in the new legislature. In the vote on Tuesday, Parliament will first of all determine its position for the negotiations with the Council. The law is intended to combat late payments in commercial transactions. MEP Markus Ferber (CDU) considers the regulation incompatible with German law and has called on the plenary to reject the report.
Read all the texts on the European elections here.
When Iran fired more than 300 drones and cruise missiles at Israel, the Mediterranean island of Cyprus was alarmed – as it was so often since April 2023, when fighting broke out in Sudan and Cyprus President Nikos Christodoulides offered the international airport in Larnaca for the evacuation of Western foreigners. In retrospect, the repatriation operation proved to be the beginning of the geopolitical “rebirth” of the small country in the extreme south-eastern corner of the EU.
Since then, the international importance of the Republic of Cyprus has no longer been limited to its function as an “unsinkable NATO aircraft carrier.” Rather, the island state is establishing itself as a humanitarian power in the eastern Mediterranean, with Cyprus being the first choice for the evacuation of thousands of foreigners from Israel following the Hamas terrorist attack on October 7. “When the Middle East explodes, Cyprus plays a central role as an evacuation point due to its geographical location,” says Hubert Faustmann, office director of the SPD-affiliated Friedrich Ebert Foundation in Nicosia. The island is also like the calm eye of the storm while conflicts are raging all around. “Cyprus embodies stability in crises in the eastern Mediterranean.”
Nicosia’s reaction to the Gaza crisis was quick and clever, not only logistically but also politically. Christodoulides initially showed clear solidarity with Israel, an important regional ally. However, he also immediately referred to the desperate situation of the Palestinians in Gaza. In doing so, he was following his country’s established political line of maintaining good relations with all sides in the region. For decades, the Republic had taken a pro-Palestinian stance but improved its relationship with Tel Aviv due to the exploitation of gas found in the sea – and had done so in such a clever way that it did not suffer any damage to its image in the Arab world.
The humanitarian supply crisis in the Gaza Strip following the start of the Israeli offensive gave Cyprus’ president an idea at the beginning of October that was initially ridiculed as a PR stunt: a humanitarian sea bridge carrying aid from the Cypriot port of Larnaca to Gaza. As the closest EU state, Cyprus was predestined to help, explained Christodoulides and began to promote the project at international forums. Contrary to expectations, the Cypriot diplomats succeeded in officially winning over the EU, the UK, the United Arab Emirates and, above all, the USA for the “Amalthea Plan,” named after a Greek goddess, by January.
Then everything happened very quickly. On March 7, EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen traveled to Larnaca and, together with Christodoulides, declared that the corridor was about to open. At the same time, US President Joe Biden told Congress in Washington that the US military would “lead an emergency mission to establish a temporary pier in the Mediterranean on the coast of the Gaza Strip.” In the meantime, Israeli export control personnel had arrived in Cyprus. However, Cypriot government representatives clarified that there were no plans to evacuate Palestinians.
On 12 March, the first Gaza supply ship “Open Arms” from the Spanish aid organization of the same name and the US aid organization “World Central Kitchen” (WCK) set sail from Larnaca with 200 tons of aid on board and reached Gaza four days later. This test voyage marked the first time Israel lifted its sea blockade of Gaza, which it had announced in 2007. The horror was all the greater when the second aid mission failed at the beginning of April because the Israeli army killed seven international WCK employees in a targeted air strike in Gaza and the aid ships returned to Larnaca. Netanyahu spoke of a “tragic accident” and two officers were dismissed. Cyprus condemned the act as “absolutely reprehensible,” but did not issue an official note of protest.
Since the deadly attack, the transports have been halted, but all sides claim to want to continue the project as soon as the safety of the aid workers is guaranteed. Meanwhile, aid is still being received in Larnaca and the UK has sent a Royal Navy ship to the eastern Mediterranean to support the “multinational humanitarian sea corridor.” The floating US port off Gaza City is due to be ready on May 1. After Israel agreed to open the port of Ashdod for aid deliveries at Washington’s insistence, deliveries from Larnaca would also be diverted there, it was said in Nicosia.
“The maritime aid corridor is a huge political boost for Cyprus,” says Faustmann. “Instead of negative news about corruption, golden passports or the Cyprus problem, the island suddenly shines through its constructive role in a highly sensitive region.” Thanks to Christodoulides’ humanitarian coup, Cyprus was also able to bring itself into play as a new potential mediator in the Middle East conflict region.
“The project makes Cyprus look good in the Arab world as a helper to the Palestinians, although the Cypriots are always careful not to upset the Israelis unnecessarily,” says Faustmann. Cyprus can also take on the role of mediator more easily because the island is not an ex-colonial power like Turkey, but a colonial victim (of the British) and not so strongly anchored in Western Europe in the Arab perception.
Since the launch of the initiative, top politicians from the USA, the EU and the region have been meeting in Cyprus. The main financial backers are the United Arab Emirates, the EU and the UK. The project is only unfortunate for the regional power Turkey, as it also considered a maritime aid mission to Gaza. However, this failed due to Turkey’s confrontational stance towards Israel. According to the Greek Cypriot newspaper “Philelefteros”, Ankara tried to derail the Amalthea plan at various levels. In defiance, Turkey now wants to send its own “freedom flotilla” from the Islamist aid organization IHH to the Gaza Strip. In 2010, a similar provocation trip was stopped by the Israeli navy, killing nine activists.
In contrast, Cypriot President Christodoulides has managed to get practically all the players in the region on board for the humanitarian corridor. Christodoulides also used the historic momentum to position his traditionally Russia-friendly country clearly in the West in terms of foreign policy – much to the annoyance of the Kremlin. Nicosia is also hoping to attract international attention to the problems within Cyprus. “If Christodoulides is clever, he will seize the opportunity to make surprising advances on the Cyprus issue,” says historian and political scientist Faustmann. “But for that to happen, Turkey would have to be offered incentives to act more constructively – and so far there are no signs of that.”
However, the turbulent situation in the Middle East is putting Cyprus under increasing pressure. Since the beginning of the year, around 4,000 migrants have landed on the island in the eastern Mediterranean, and the refugee camps are overcrowded. Most of the new arrivals in Cyprus are Syrian refugees who previously lived in Lebanon. According to Christodoulidis, an agreement is now being worked on with Lebanon to prevent unwanted Syrian refugees from entering the EU. “We want to help Lebanon deal with the refugees so that no more come to Cyprus,” he said in an interview with Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland published on Sunday.
He is looking forward to traveling to Lebanon on 2 May with EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen to announce a concrete EU financial package. In addition, support for Lebanese institutions such as the armed forces is also on the agenda. He had asked the EU for help, said Christodoulidis. There should also be a discussion about which people from Syria should be given the chance of asylum in the EU. “We are explicitly calling for certain areas in Syria to be classified as safe,” he said. with dpa
EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has emphasized that the EU wants to take stronger action against unfair international competition. “We will push our partners harder than before for fair competitive conditions for our companies,” said von der Leyen on Sunday evening, according to the speech transcript at the opening of the Hanover Exhibition. “Where we see abuse, we will not hesitate to use our defense instruments,” she said, referring to EVs from China.
The EU has an open approach to trade. “At the same time, we see clouds on the horizon. For example, that massive subsidies are flowing to manufacturers of electric vehicles in China,” she added. “And that other markets are already closing themselves off against this, for example, the USA, Mexico or Turkey.” The Commission President committed to concluding further trade agreements and partnerships. The aim is to diversify the EU’s supply of critical raw materials or clean hydrogen, for example.
In addition to trade policy, von der Leyen mentioned four other points to strengthen the EU’s competitiveness. She called on the EU finance ministers to make rapid progress in completing the Capital Markets Union. European companies should be offered cheap, clean energy from domestic sources as quickly as possible. “The mobility of workers within Europe must become easier,” said von der Leyen. Legal migration is also a key location factor. The fourth area she mentioned was digitalization. Thanks to European companies, the EU has an unparalleled wealth of data at its disposal, she said. rtr/ber
According to a study, industrial companies in Europe are inadequately prepared for hacker attacks. Only two percent of companies are in the best possible position here, while 17 percent can at least be said to have good protection, according to a study by network equipment provider Cisco ahead of the Hanover Exhibition, which starts on Monday. In contrast, more than 80 percent of companies need to take action.
In comparison with other sectors, the industry is only in the lower midfield here. Cisco determined the best values for technology providers, where 28 percent are well or very well prepared, followed by the financial sector with 23 percent. Europe’s industry also performed poorly in a global comparison. In the USA, 29 percent of industrial companies are well or very well prepared against cyberattacks, ten percentage points more than in Europe. The worst performers in Europe were educational institutions and the healthcare sector.
For the study, Cisco surveyed more than 8,000 company managers worldwide in January and February, including almost 2,000 in Europe. The main reason for the poor performance of many industrial companies is the longevity of many production facilities, said Christian Korff, member of the management board at Cisco in Germany.
The situation is somewhat better when it comes to artificial intelligence (AI). 34 percent of industry is well or very well positioned in this area. However, this is not really satisfactory. Although 64 percent of companies have an AI strategy, only 34 percent have the technical infrastructure to actually use AI. “And when I see that a third of industrial companies still don’t have an AI strategy, I get scared,” added Korff. dpa
Former EU Commissioner and President of the European Parliament Antonio Tajani is running again for the European elections. The leader of Forza Italia will head his party’s list in four of Italy’s five constituencies. “I have decided to run, may my wife forgive me,” he said at a Forza Italia congress in Rome on Saturday.
Tajani was officially confirmed as Forza Italia’s successor following the death of party founder and former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi in February. The 70-year-old is currently Foreign Minister. However, it is unclear whether he will now move back to Brussels. He said he wanted to put his European experience at the disposal of “the election campaign.”
Tajani is the first of the leaders of the major parties in Italy to enter the ring for the European elections, which are likely to be more of a show fight. A few hours later, Elly Schlein, leader of the social democratic Partito Democartico, also announced that she would run for first place on the election list, albeit only in two constituencies. “I’m running, but I’m staying in the Italian parliament,” Schlein said on Sunday. The candidacy here is also: a symbol.
Because Giorgia Meloni from the Fratelli d’Italia will also follow suit. The Prime Minister is expected to announce her candidacy next Sunday at the Fratelli party conference in Pescara. In Italy, the deadline for the lists for the ballot papers expires on May 1. Meloni has also already announced that she does not want to move to Strasbourg after the election.
With their tactical candidacies, the party leaders are taking the vote at the beginning of June to a new level. Meloni is hoping to consolidate her position as the leader of her governing coalition – and to position herself even more strongly, especially against her internal rival Matteo Salvini. Unlike his coalition partners, the Lega leader will not be standing in the European elections.
His Lega, which received 34 percent of the vote in the 2019 European elections, is currently polling at 8.2 percent. Meloni’s Fratelli is predicted to receive 28 percent. And Foreign Minister Tajani and his Forza Italia are hoping for 10 percent. asf
ChatGPT and other models of generative artificial intelligence (AI) have triggered a wave of fascination in the past year. The algorithms can effortlessly create seemingly plausible content such as images and texts. However, making them available to the public has also brought numerous skeptics onto the scene. What is already a major productivity gain in some areas still harbors the risk of high error rates for many applications and fuels fears of control losses.
However, instead of limiting ourselves to discussions about the opportunities and risks of new AI models, another fact should be taken into account: The already small number of large tech companies can exploit and even increase their power with generative AI. The EU, but also national governments, can and should take effective countermeasures here and set democratically legitimized guard rails for the development and dissemination of innovative AI.
Although (generative) AI – given the wealth of complex tasks in today’s working world – cannot yet be used as a broadly reliable tool, broad social acceptance already appears to exist: In US surveys, over 30 percent of respondents stated that they use generative AI to seek advice for financial decisions.
However, these systems still suffer from high error rates and sometimes produce nonsensical or systematically distorted content. This is largely because the language models provided were not developed for specific purposes. As a result, they are not suitable for use as financial advisors or as a substitute for a visit to the doctor, for example. For the currently existing language models, the largest available mass of digitized data was used indiscriminately – and only then adapted and verified to a limited extent by human expertise.
However, the data initially used is still riddled with errors and stereotypes, as manifested in the society that generated this very data in the history of mankind. This is a problem because the much more difficult development of scalable causal methods, which are fundamental to robust and explainable systems, is still at an early stage.
The design of the developers and companies plays a decisive role in the content that generative models reproduce. In particular, the choice of data on which a GPT model is based determines how robust and fair or how biased and dangerous the produced content is. Since the predominant generative models are developed by a handful of large companies such as Alphabet, Meta and Microsoft, they are not neutral truth or information machines but reflect the internal development and marketing decisions of these companies.
From an economic perspective, generative AI models, as well as other smart devices such as VR glasses, can continue the dominance of a few large tech companies. Due to their already established position in cloud infrastructures and operating systems, companies such as Alphabet and Microsoft appear to be out of reach, and the other three tech giants Amazon, Apple and Meta have also invested billions in AI. This should give pause for thought when speculating about the future of generative AI.
It clarifies the incentives that these developing companies follow. At the same time, it reveals more direct regulatory options for action. Companies that develop and market AI can decide how they develop data-based software, and as a society, we can influence this through a regulatory framework. Discussing this is essential and should not be overshadowed by discussions about whether GPT models can surpass human intelligence, gain self-awareness or get out of control.
The new EU regulations on digital services and markets – DSA and DMA – must be implemented effectively. They aim to break up the market dominance of the large digital groups and make digital services more transparent and reliable. They can therefore also make an important contribution to containing the risks of AI, which arise not least due to the interests of powerful tech companies. This could sustainably promote the social acceptance of (generative) AI and enable productivity gains through innovation.
As a regulatory body, the European Commission would have to invest more than previously planned in the necessary technical and competitive institutional expertise. This could ensure that tech companies do not take implicit control over the implementation of regulations despite their impressive resources in the ongoing stakeholder proceedings.
Another effective way to achieve greater transparency and a better understanding of AI-influenced market outcomes would be to allow independent researchers access to gatekeeper data in the Digital Markets Act, similar to the Digital Services Act.
Ultimately, however, the quality of future AI will also depend on the level of investment in data and computing infrastructures and interdisciplinary basic research. After all, it is not enough to regulate successful and highly innovative companies. The potential for new leaps in innovation, which can overcome existing market constellations, must also be promoted.
Hannes Ullrich is Deputy Head of the Department of Enterprises and Markets at the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin). He is leading a research project on artificial intelligence in the healthcare sector, which is funded by the European Research Council’s Top-Level Research funding program.
The relief over the green light from Washington for billions in new aid to Ukraine is likely to be great when the EU foreign and defense ministers meet today. That is good because, without the Americans, Ukraine would probably be lost. However, the $60 billion aid package from the USA does not mean that the Europeans are off the hook. The Jumbo Council in Luxembourg will focus on what the EU states can now do additionally.
There is positive news from Europe. “I expect new announcements for air defense capabilities for Ukraine soon,” said NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg on Friday after a crisis meeting. Two or three countries will likely follow Germany’s example in the next few days and provide Ukraine with additional air defense systems. Prime Minister Mark Rutte has signaled that the Netherlands could also hand over Patriots and buy additional systems from other countries. In addition to the Patriots, the French-Italian Aster SAMP/T air defense system could also be involved. Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba, who will be in Luxembourg today via video call together with Defense Minister Rustem Umjerow, has put the requirement at a minimum of seven systems.
Over lunch, the foreign and defense ministers will continue the discussion on new Iran sanctions from the summit. Annalena Baerbock and State Secretary Siemtje Möller will be arriving from Berlin. One or two ministers are likely to criticize why the services of EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell are taking so long to prepare the basis for a decision. The plan is to add missiles to the sanctions regime against drones and to extend it geographically to Iran’s proxies from Lebanon and Yemen to Iraq and Syria. Legal texts will not yet be available. Ideally, a political agreement will be reached, but even this is reportedly not guaranteed.
From agricultural policy to industrial and sustainability policy – the list of votes in the last week of the parliamentary session is long. However, there are also dossiers on the agenda that will need further negotiations in the new legislature.
Approval of the Commission’s discharge proposals is considered relatively certain. An expert opinion from the Legal Affairs Committee in Parliament, requested by the Environment Committee, does not stand in the way of this: the service has no legal objections. It will be interesting to see whether amendments get through. If so, the member states would have to accept them word for word so that they can be adopted before the elections. The most likely scenario, however, is that the plenary session agrees without amendments and the dossier is adopted in time for the election campaign.
The issue is controversial, but Parliament is nevertheless likely to approve the trilogue agreement because it is the last chance to extend trade facilitation for Ukraine. Parliament’s demand to also adopt safeguard measures for grain is not part of the agreement. Elsewhere, however, protective measures for agricultural products were extended once again at the insistence of several member states. This should make it easier for critics of free trade – especially agricultural politicians and MPs from countries bordering Ukraine – to agree.
Parliament adopted its negotiating position in January. The position is intended to be finalized with a new vote and would therefore no longer need to be confirmed after the EU elections. It can be assumed that this will succeed. There is still no agreement in sight on the part of the member states.
On Monday, Parliament will vote on the trilogue result on the right to repair. A large majority is expected. The Member States must then also adopt the result. This is scheduled for May 15 in the Committee of Permanent Representatives (Coreper); on May 23, the consumer protection ministers will then vote in the Competitiveness Council.
After long negotiations in the Council and most recently between the Council and Parliament, the Parliament must now vote on the negotiated trilogue result. The EPP, Renew and a majority of the Social Democrats will probably vote in favor of the compromise on the new European debt rules. The left-wing group and the Greens will reject them, as the spending cuts in the Member States triggered by the rules could hit green investments. The two right-wing groups will also say no. It is currently expected that a majority will vote in favor, but the margin will not be large.
The EU wants to reduce the release of microplastics into the environment by 30 percent by 2030. The legislative proposal presented by the EU Commission in October is also intended to contribute to this. According to the proposal, all players who handle plastic pellets will be subject to obligations. In detail: to avoid losses, to draw up risk assessment plans and to remedy damage in the event of a loss. The Environment Committee adopted its report in March and the plenary will vote on it on Tuesday. Negotiations with the Council will then begin in the fall at the earliest.
In future, products manufactured using forced labor will no longer be made available on the EU internal market, sold or exported from there. The EU Parliament and Council agreed on the new regulation at the beginning of March. The Council already adopted the result in mid-March. The Parliament is expected to vote on Tuesday.
The trilogue agreement on the Supply Chain Directive, the adoption of which has been on hold in the Council for several weeks, must now also be formally approved by Parliament. This is scheduled for Wednesday afternoon. The member states have once again significantly toned down the outcome of the negotiations, for example, by reducing the scope of application and deleting the risk sectors.
On Wednesday afternoon, MEPs will also vote on the trilogue result from the beginning of March. The provisional agreement aims to make packaging on the EU internal market safer and more sustainable. For example, all packaging should be recyclable by 2030. It is unlikely that two amendments tabled by Andreas Glück (FDP) shortly before the deadline will be adopted. Glück wants to remove certain reusable targets for packaging used by companies to transport products between their own sites and within a Member State. In the Council, the Permanent Representatives Committee (Coreper) had already adopted the result of the trilogue negotiations before Easter.
The Council and Parliament already agreed on a joint legislative text in December. Coreper confirmed the agreement shortly afterward. MEPs must now formally adopt the result, according to the agenda next Thursday at noon. The regulation expands the previous Ecodesign Directive, extends its scope to almost all products and provides for a ban on unsold clothing, shoes and accessories.
It is expected that there will be a majority in Parliament for the political agreement reached in February. It provides for the limit values for many air pollutants to be aligned with the WHO guideline values by 2030. This would tighten the limit values significantly. It is expected that the limit values for nitrogen oxides and particulate matter in particular will be exceeded at numerous measuring stations, making driving bans and production bans for industrial plants necessary.
The trilogue agreement on the Net-Zero Industry Act should pass the plenary session on Thursday quite smoothly. At the end of February, the Industry Committee had already approved the text, which the European Parliament and member states had negotiated within a year. The NZIA is intended to facilitate the establishment of factories for climate-friendly technologies such as wind power or heat pumps.
The Gigabit Infrastructure Act aims to accelerate the expansion of high-performance communication infrastructure – fiber optics and 5G – across Europe. The new regulation replaces the directive on reducing broadband costs from 2014. Among other things, the Parliament and Council agreed in February to simplify approval procedures, remove bureaucratic hurdles and introduce the principle of tacit approval. This means that infrastructure projects are automatically deemed to have been approved if the authorities do not approve them within four months. Parliament has also ensured that roaming charges will be abolished in the EU from 2029. vis
In March, the Council and Parliament agreed on the Cyber Solidarity Act, which aims to make the Union more resilient and responsive to cyber threats. The regulation aims to strengthen the Union’s capacity to detect, prevent and respond to cybersecurity threats and incidents. An amendment to the 2019 Cybersecurity Act on managed security services is also intended to improve cyber resilience. At the same time, the EU is strengthening its cooperation mechanisms. The regulation also provides for the creation of a cyber emergency mechanism. vis
In January, the Commission presented a package of measures to support European start-ups and SMEs in the development of trustworthy artificial intelligence. This includes an amendment to the EuroHPC Regulation with regard to the establishment of AI factories, which will become a new area of activity of the EU High Performance Computing Joint Undertaking (EuroHPC). It also includes financial support in this area from existing programs. vis
The Late Payment Regulation is one of the voting texts that will have to be dealt with further in the new legislature. In the vote on Tuesday, Parliament will first of all determine its position for the negotiations with the Council. The law is intended to combat late payments in commercial transactions. MEP Markus Ferber (CDU) considers the regulation incompatible with German law and has called on the plenary to reject the report.
Read all the texts on the European elections here.
When Iran fired more than 300 drones and cruise missiles at Israel, the Mediterranean island of Cyprus was alarmed – as it was so often since April 2023, when fighting broke out in Sudan and Cyprus President Nikos Christodoulides offered the international airport in Larnaca for the evacuation of Western foreigners. In retrospect, the repatriation operation proved to be the beginning of the geopolitical “rebirth” of the small country in the extreme south-eastern corner of the EU.
Since then, the international importance of the Republic of Cyprus has no longer been limited to its function as an “unsinkable NATO aircraft carrier.” Rather, the island state is establishing itself as a humanitarian power in the eastern Mediterranean, with Cyprus being the first choice for the evacuation of thousands of foreigners from Israel following the Hamas terrorist attack on October 7. “When the Middle East explodes, Cyprus plays a central role as an evacuation point due to its geographical location,” says Hubert Faustmann, office director of the SPD-affiliated Friedrich Ebert Foundation in Nicosia. The island is also like the calm eye of the storm while conflicts are raging all around. “Cyprus embodies stability in crises in the eastern Mediterranean.”
Nicosia’s reaction to the Gaza crisis was quick and clever, not only logistically but also politically. Christodoulides initially showed clear solidarity with Israel, an important regional ally. However, he also immediately referred to the desperate situation of the Palestinians in Gaza. In doing so, he was following his country’s established political line of maintaining good relations with all sides in the region. For decades, the Republic had taken a pro-Palestinian stance but improved its relationship with Tel Aviv due to the exploitation of gas found in the sea – and had done so in such a clever way that it did not suffer any damage to its image in the Arab world.
The humanitarian supply crisis in the Gaza Strip following the start of the Israeli offensive gave Cyprus’ president an idea at the beginning of October that was initially ridiculed as a PR stunt: a humanitarian sea bridge carrying aid from the Cypriot port of Larnaca to Gaza. As the closest EU state, Cyprus was predestined to help, explained Christodoulides and began to promote the project at international forums. Contrary to expectations, the Cypriot diplomats succeeded in officially winning over the EU, the UK, the United Arab Emirates and, above all, the USA for the “Amalthea Plan,” named after a Greek goddess, by January.
Then everything happened very quickly. On March 7, EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen traveled to Larnaca and, together with Christodoulides, declared that the corridor was about to open. At the same time, US President Joe Biden told Congress in Washington that the US military would “lead an emergency mission to establish a temporary pier in the Mediterranean on the coast of the Gaza Strip.” In the meantime, Israeli export control personnel had arrived in Cyprus. However, Cypriot government representatives clarified that there were no plans to evacuate Palestinians.
On 12 March, the first Gaza supply ship “Open Arms” from the Spanish aid organization of the same name and the US aid organization “World Central Kitchen” (WCK) set sail from Larnaca with 200 tons of aid on board and reached Gaza four days later. This test voyage marked the first time Israel lifted its sea blockade of Gaza, which it had announced in 2007. The horror was all the greater when the second aid mission failed at the beginning of April because the Israeli army killed seven international WCK employees in a targeted air strike in Gaza and the aid ships returned to Larnaca. Netanyahu spoke of a “tragic accident” and two officers were dismissed. Cyprus condemned the act as “absolutely reprehensible,” but did not issue an official note of protest.
Since the deadly attack, the transports have been halted, but all sides claim to want to continue the project as soon as the safety of the aid workers is guaranteed. Meanwhile, aid is still being received in Larnaca and the UK has sent a Royal Navy ship to the eastern Mediterranean to support the “multinational humanitarian sea corridor.” The floating US port off Gaza City is due to be ready on May 1. After Israel agreed to open the port of Ashdod for aid deliveries at Washington’s insistence, deliveries from Larnaca would also be diverted there, it was said in Nicosia.
“The maritime aid corridor is a huge political boost for Cyprus,” says Faustmann. “Instead of negative news about corruption, golden passports or the Cyprus problem, the island suddenly shines through its constructive role in a highly sensitive region.” Thanks to Christodoulides’ humanitarian coup, Cyprus was also able to bring itself into play as a new potential mediator in the Middle East conflict region.
“The project makes Cyprus look good in the Arab world as a helper to the Palestinians, although the Cypriots are always careful not to upset the Israelis unnecessarily,” says Faustmann. Cyprus can also take on the role of mediator more easily because the island is not an ex-colonial power like Turkey, but a colonial victim (of the British) and not so strongly anchored in Western Europe in the Arab perception.
Since the launch of the initiative, top politicians from the USA, the EU and the region have been meeting in Cyprus. The main financial backers are the United Arab Emirates, the EU and the UK. The project is only unfortunate for the regional power Turkey, as it also considered a maritime aid mission to Gaza. However, this failed due to Turkey’s confrontational stance towards Israel. According to the Greek Cypriot newspaper “Philelefteros”, Ankara tried to derail the Amalthea plan at various levels. In defiance, Turkey now wants to send its own “freedom flotilla” from the Islamist aid organization IHH to the Gaza Strip. In 2010, a similar provocation trip was stopped by the Israeli navy, killing nine activists.
In contrast, Cypriot President Christodoulides has managed to get practically all the players in the region on board for the humanitarian corridor. Christodoulides also used the historic momentum to position his traditionally Russia-friendly country clearly in the West in terms of foreign policy – much to the annoyance of the Kremlin. Nicosia is also hoping to attract international attention to the problems within Cyprus. “If Christodoulides is clever, he will seize the opportunity to make surprising advances on the Cyprus issue,” says historian and political scientist Faustmann. “But for that to happen, Turkey would have to be offered incentives to act more constructively – and so far there are no signs of that.”
However, the turbulent situation in the Middle East is putting Cyprus under increasing pressure. Since the beginning of the year, around 4,000 migrants have landed on the island in the eastern Mediterranean, and the refugee camps are overcrowded. Most of the new arrivals in Cyprus are Syrian refugees who previously lived in Lebanon. According to Christodoulidis, an agreement is now being worked on with Lebanon to prevent unwanted Syrian refugees from entering the EU. “We want to help Lebanon deal with the refugees so that no more come to Cyprus,” he said in an interview with Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland published on Sunday.
He is looking forward to traveling to Lebanon on 2 May with EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen to announce a concrete EU financial package. In addition, support for Lebanese institutions such as the armed forces is also on the agenda. He had asked the EU for help, said Christodoulidis. There should also be a discussion about which people from Syria should be given the chance of asylum in the EU. “We are explicitly calling for certain areas in Syria to be classified as safe,” he said. with dpa
EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has emphasized that the EU wants to take stronger action against unfair international competition. “We will push our partners harder than before for fair competitive conditions for our companies,” said von der Leyen on Sunday evening, according to the speech transcript at the opening of the Hanover Exhibition. “Where we see abuse, we will not hesitate to use our defense instruments,” she said, referring to EVs from China.
The EU has an open approach to trade. “At the same time, we see clouds on the horizon. For example, that massive subsidies are flowing to manufacturers of electric vehicles in China,” she added. “And that other markets are already closing themselves off against this, for example, the USA, Mexico or Turkey.” The Commission President committed to concluding further trade agreements and partnerships. The aim is to diversify the EU’s supply of critical raw materials or clean hydrogen, for example.
In addition to trade policy, von der Leyen mentioned four other points to strengthen the EU’s competitiveness. She called on the EU finance ministers to make rapid progress in completing the Capital Markets Union. European companies should be offered cheap, clean energy from domestic sources as quickly as possible. “The mobility of workers within Europe must become easier,” said von der Leyen. Legal migration is also a key location factor. The fourth area she mentioned was digitalization. Thanks to European companies, the EU has an unparalleled wealth of data at its disposal, she said. rtr/ber
According to a study, industrial companies in Europe are inadequately prepared for hacker attacks. Only two percent of companies are in the best possible position here, while 17 percent can at least be said to have good protection, according to a study by network equipment provider Cisco ahead of the Hanover Exhibition, which starts on Monday. In contrast, more than 80 percent of companies need to take action.
In comparison with other sectors, the industry is only in the lower midfield here. Cisco determined the best values for technology providers, where 28 percent are well or very well prepared, followed by the financial sector with 23 percent. Europe’s industry also performed poorly in a global comparison. In the USA, 29 percent of industrial companies are well or very well prepared against cyberattacks, ten percentage points more than in Europe. The worst performers in Europe were educational institutions and the healthcare sector.
For the study, Cisco surveyed more than 8,000 company managers worldwide in January and February, including almost 2,000 in Europe. The main reason for the poor performance of many industrial companies is the longevity of many production facilities, said Christian Korff, member of the management board at Cisco in Germany.
The situation is somewhat better when it comes to artificial intelligence (AI). 34 percent of industry is well or very well positioned in this area. However, this is not really satisfactory. Although 64 percent of companies have an AI strategy, only 34 percent have the technical infrastructure to actually use AI. “And when I see that a third of industrial companies still don’t have an AI strategy, I get scared,” added Korff. dpa
Former EU Commissioner and President of the European Parliament Antonio Tajani is running again for the European elections. The leader of Forza Italia will head his party’s list in four of Italy’s five constituencies. “I have decided to run, may my wife forgive me,” he said at a Forza Italia congress in Rome on Saturday.
Tajani was officially confirmed as Forza Italia’s successor following the death of party founder and former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi in February. The 70-year-old is currently Foreign Minister. However, it is unclear whether he will now move back to Brussels. He said he wanted to put his European experience at the disposal of “the election campaign.”
Tajani is the first of the leaders of the major parties in Italy to enter the ring for the European elections, which are likely to be more of a show fight. A few hours later, Elly Schlein, leader of the social democratic Partito Democartico, also announced that she would run for first place on the election list, albeit only in two constituencies. “I’m running, but I’m staying in the Italian parliament,” Schlein said on Sunday. The candidacy here is also: a symbol.
Because Giorgia Meloni from the Fratelli d’Italia will also follow suit. The Prime Minister is expected to announce her candidacy next Sunday at the Fratelli party conference in Pescara. In Italy, the deadline for the lists for the ballot papers expires on May 1. Meloni has also already announced that she does not want to move to Strasbourg after the election.
With their tactical candidacies, the party leaders are taking the vote at the beginning of June to a new level. Meloni is hoping to consolidate her position as the leader of her governing coalition – and to position herself even more strongly, especially against her internal rival Matteo Salvini. Unlike his coalition partners, the Lega leader will not be standing in the European elections.
His Lega, which received 34 percent of the vote in the 2019 European elections, is currently polling at 8.2 percent. Meloni’s Fratelli is predicted to receive 28 percent. And Foreign Minister Tajani and his Forza Italia are hoping for 10 percent. asf
ChatGPT and other models of generative artificial intelligence (AI) have triggered a wave of fascination in the past year. The algorithms can effortlessly create seemingly plausible content such as images and texts. However, making them available to the public has also brought numerous skeptics onto the scene. What is already a major productivity gain in some areas still harbors the risk of high error rates for many applications and fuels fears of control losses.
However, instead of limiting ourselves to discussions about the opportunities and risks of new AI models, another fact should be taken into account: The already small number of large tech companies can exploit and even increase their power with generative AI. The EU, but also national governments, can and should take effective countermeasures here and set democratically legitimized guard rails for the development and dissemination of innovative AI.
Although (generative) AI – given the wealth of complex tasks in today’s working world – cannot yet be used as a broadly reliable tool, broad social acceptance already appears to exist: In US surveys, over 30 percent of respondents stated that they use generative AI to seek advice for financial decisions.
However, these systems still suffer from high error rates and sometimes produce nonsensical or systematically distorted content. This is largely because the language models provided were not developed for specific purposes. As a result, they are not suitable for use as financial advisors or as a substitute for a visit to the doctor, for example. For the currently existing language models, the largest available mass of digitized data was used indiscriminately – and only then adapted and verified to a limited extent by human expertise.
However, the data initially used is still riddled with errors and stereotypes, as manifested in the society that generated this very data in the history of mankind. This is a problem because the much more difficult development of scalable causal methods, which are fundamental to robust and explainable systems, is still at an early stage.
The design of the developers and companies plays a decisive role in the content that generative models reproduce. In particular, the choice of data on which a GPT model is based determines how robust and fair or how biased and dangerous the produced content is. Since the predominant generative models are developed by a handful of large companies such as Alphabet, Meta and Microsoft, they are not neutral truth or information machines but reflect the internal development and marketing decisions of these companies.
From an economic perspective, generative AI models, as well as other smart devices such as VR glasses, can continue the dominance of a few large tech companies. Due to their already established position in cloud infrastructures and operating systems, companies such as Alphabet and Microsoft appear to be out of reach, and the other three tech giants Amazon, Apple and Meta have also invested billions in AI. This should give pause for thought when speculating about the future of generative AI.
It clarifies the incentives that these developing companies follow. At the same time, it reveals more direct regulatory options for action. Companies that develop and market AI can decide how they develop data-based software, and as a society, we can influence this through a regulatory framework. Discussing this is essential and should not be overshadowed by discussions about whether GPT models can surpass human intelligence, gain self-awareness or get out of control.
The new EU regulations on digital services and markets – DSA and DMA – must be implemented effectively. They aim to break up the market dominance of the large digital groups and make digital services more transparent and reliable. They can therefore also make an important contribution to containing the risks of AI, which arise not least due to the interests of powerful tech companies. This could sustainably promote the social acceptance of (generative) AI and enable productivity gains through innovation.
As a regulatory body, the European Commission would have to invest more than previously planned in the necessary technical and competitive institutional expertise. This could ensure that tech companies do not take implicit control over the implementation of regulations despite their impressive resources in the ongoing stakeholder proceedings.
Another effective way to achieve greater transparency and a better understanding of AI-influenced market outcomes would be to allow independent researchers access to gatekeeper data in the Digital Markets Act, similar to the Digital Services Act.
Ultimately, however, the quality of future AI will also depend on the level of investment in data and computing infrastructures and interdisciplinary basic research. After all, it is not enough to regulate successful and highly innovative companies. The potential for new leaps in innovation, which can overcome existing market constellations, must also be promoted.
Hannes Ullrich is Deputy Head of the Department of Enterprises and Markets at the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin). He is leading a research project on artificial intelligence in the healthcare sector, which is funded by the European Research Council’s Top-Level Research funding program.
