EU energy ministers are meeting today to decide on emergency measures to counter rising energy prices. For the Czech presidency, it is already the third extraordinary Council meeting: “And I’m not sure it will be the last, as the situation is not necessarily improving,” a senior EU official told Europe.Table. A letter to the EU Commission in which 15 member states call for a gas price cap caused a stir in the run-up to the meeting. Paris also wants the cap, unlike Berlin. France’s President Emmanuel Macron is less open to the MidCat pipeline, which in turn Chancellor Olaf Scholz approves of. In her column “What’s Cooking in Brussels” this week, Claire Stam takes you on a ride on the energy carousel.
In France, it is not only rising prices that are bringing people to the streets. Above all, it is Macron’s planned pension reform bill that is causing an uproar. Thousands of people protested throughout the country yesterday. But Macron wants to get his way – not least to prove his reputation as a reformer. The risk is high that the plan will be rejected in the National Assembly because Macron no longer has an absolute majority. That is why he will have to make concessions, as Tanja Kuchenbecker analyzes.
Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Bosnia and Herzegovina once again shifted into the public spotlight. The Balkans are of “strategic importance” for Germany, said German Chancellor Olaf Scholz during a trip through the region in the summer. But Bosnia-Herzegovina struggles with a complicated and fragile government system: almost 30 years after the Dayton Peace Agreement, it is still in the grip of nationalist elites from the three largest ethnic groups. On Sunday, the Balkan country will hold elections. Stephan Israel took a look at the situation in the run-up to the elections.
France often sees nationwide protests in the fall. This year it was only a matter of time. On Thursday, strikes and rallies were held against President Emmanuel Macron’s planned pension reform and rising prices. Unions called for nationwide strikes, which affected long-distance trains, mass transit, schools and hospitals, among others. “Raise salaries, not the retirement age,” is the slogan of the unionists.
Paris tried to defuse potential protests against inflation with billions in aid and an energy price cap more than other European countries – the government’s fear of a new protest movement like the yellow vests was too great. But the planned pension reform bill provided further fuel for protests. It is to be discussed this fall, presented before February and voted on in parliament before coming into force in July 2023 at the latest. The plan is to raise the official retirement age by four months per year from 62 to 65 till 2031. The number of years paid in to receive a full pension is also up for debate.
Although the pension reform is an explosive matter, Macron is determined to stick with it despite the energy crisis. He stressed that France needed money for health care and schools. But another reason weighs more heavily: Since his re-election, he no longer seems as radiant as before. During his first term in office, he inspired enthusiasm in Europe with his euphoric proposals for the renewal of the EU. But things have been quiet around him for some time now. People in France say he needs to prove his dynamism once again to find a new élan.
Macron initially wanted to advance quickly with the project. But then he changed his mind and postponed the concrete presentation of the reform. He made the decision at a dinner with the most important ministers, who urged caution. Nevertheless, the project is to be advanced quickly. The president now relies increasingly on consultation with the social partners and the parliamentary groups of the other parties to define the broad lines, because he knows that pension reform will be met with much criticism.
In recent weeks, the reform also caused tensions within the ruling party. Now the head of state is counting on everyone to agree to the project and is thus taking a little more time. A long professional career and hard work are to be taken into account in the project, but also an increase of the minimum pension. With this, the government wants to meet the demands of the unions and the left-wing parties. The stakes are high for Macron: He has to unite his own ranks and prove to France and observers around the world that he has lost none of his strength.
The risk that the reform will be rejected in the National Assembly is high, because Macron no longer holds an absolute majority since the parliamentary elections in the summer, but only a relative majority. He also has to offer something to the conservatives, who are more likely to vote in favor of the reform than the left. As a result, the reform could lead to a further shift to the right in Macron’s politics.
Not only parliament, but also the power of the streets can thwart Macron’s plans. It would not be the first time in France that a reform is overturned because protests paralyze France. So far, however, the social partners don’t really seem to be united. Politics professor Dominique Andolfatto of the University of Bourgogne-Franche-Comté is skeptical: “The unions are not united on the tactics of action. A union has yet to be found.” There are too many rivalries between unions, experts say.
Even if the unions still manage to reach an agreement, Macron has nothing to lose, he can only win. He has set out to reform. He must prove his reputation as a reformer. Not only that, but he cannot run again in the next presidential election. Only two consecutive terms are allowed in France. So Macron might well go through with his plans – even in the face of opposition. After the yellow vests, the pandemic and the Ukraine war, he is a seasoned crisis manager by now.
The nation’s citizens vote with their feet every day. Last year alone, 170,000 residents of Bosnia and Herzegovina left their homes, out of a population of 3.5 million. On Sunday, new parliaments will be elected in the torn country and the leadership of the entities will be selected. There is little hope that the outcome of the elections will change the misery and put a stop to the exodus.
Almost 30 years after the end of the war and the Dayton Peace Agreement, the former Yugoslav republic is still in the grip of nationalist elites from the three largest ethnic groups, the Muslim Bosniaks, the Bosnian Serbs and Croats. It is an ethnocracy in which posts are distributed according to ethnicity and party affiliation and politicians fill their pockets, while the majority of the population struggles to make ends meet on average salaries of €800 and inflation of 16 percent.
The election campaign progressed correspondingly apathetically. In Dayton, the international community brought an end to the conflict after 100,000 dead and millions of displaced persons, but simultaneously left the country with an unsustainable government structure. Elections are held at the federal level and in the two entities, the Bosniak-Croat Federation and the Republika Srpska. In addition, there is the special district of Brčko, which is subordinate to the overall state. Up for election are 14 separate parliaments, 5 presidents, hundreds of deputies and 136 ministers.
Most recently, Russia’s war against Ukraine shifted the focus to the Western Balkan states, the economic woes and the political vacuum. Russia, but also China and Turkey, have used the vacuum to exert political and economic influence in the Balkans. For the first time since the withdrawal of the German armed forces a good ten years ago, the German government decided in the summer to once again deploy 50 soldiers to Bosnia-Herzegovina for the security operation EUFOR (European Union Force) Althea, also partly in anticipation of possible tensions surrounding the elections on Sunday.
Milorad Dodik, strongman of the Serb entity, repeatedly causes unrest, most recently in his role as a member of the three-member presidency of the federal state and now again as a candidate for the presidency of Republika Srpska. At the end of 2021, Dodik threatened to leave the joint institutions and secede from the Bosnian Serb Republic. The US government subsequently imposed sanctions on the politician. Dodik is undermining the federal state and has set up parallel structures in Republika Srpska, the US government said in its statement. The separatist activities served to divert attention from corruption. Dodik allegedly used his position to amass a personal fortune through bribery, kickbacks and other forms of corruption. Within the EU, Hungary avoided similar punitive measures. Milorad Dodik openly supports Russia’s war against Ukraine and visited Vladimir Putin in Moscow ten days ago, not for the first time.
It cannot be ruled out that Dodik, despite Moscow’s support, will lose the elections to a rival, albeit a slightly more moderate nationalist. The dominant nationalist parties of the Bosnian Croats and Bosniaks play a not much less destructive role. Christian Schmidt, former minister of agriculture under Angela Merkel and a longtime member of the German Bundestag, is right in the middle. Merkel had still pushed the conservative through for the post of High Representative (OHR) in Sarajevo, a kind of governor in the Bosnian semi-protectorate.
Christian Schmidt recently caused a stir beyond the country’s borders with an angry outburst about Bosnia’s political class. The OHR can theoretically enact or annul laws and remove politicians from office. Schmidt’s predecessors, however, have been very reluctant to use the so-called Bonn powers in recent years. Almost 30 years after the end of the war, the majority of experts and observers believe that the time has come to abolish the OHR.
Others argue, not wrongly, that without Christian Schmidt, the weekend elections could not take place. The parties themselves failed to agree on a law to organize and finance them in the run-up to the elections. The total paralysis of the institutions is in the interest of the nationalists on all sides, in order to secure sinecures and work toward a division of the country in the longer term.
In 2003, the EU held out the prospect of accession to all six Balkan states. However, Bosnia-Herzegovina, like Kosovo, has not even been granted candidate status. As an ethnocracy and with a dysfunctional government, the chances are not looking good for the country. Those who do not belong to any of the three ethnic groups have no passive voting rights, a fact that the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg already criticized many years ago.
The Balkans are of “strategic importance” for Germany, said German Chancellor Olaf Scholz during a trip through the region in the summer. However, in order for Bosnia to live up to this importance, the Dayton constitution urgently needs to be revised. However, both Bosnia and the international community, which is the guarantor of the Dayton Peace Agreement, lack the political strength to undertake such an overhaul.
Europe’s 27 energy ministers will meet today in the Justus Lipsius Building – not far from the famous (but not as good) Maison Antoine, which has already served countless “cornets de frites” to weary diplomats. For the Czech presidency, it will be the third extraordinary Council meeting since July 1. “And I’m not sure it will be the last, as the situation is not necessarily improving,” says a senior EU official.
What has Brussels abuzz is a letter to the EU Commission signed by 15 member states calling for a gas price cap. “I see that these 15 member states are growing increasingly nervous about what they perceive as a lack of response from the European Commission on this issue,” the official said. “But some member states continue to oppose this measure.” The countries in question are from Central and Eastern Europe, but also the very economic and political heavyweight Germany. So the official adds teasingly, “But we are doing everything to please Germany.”
But the German government fears that a gas price cap would create the wrong incentives. It favors a price brake, the toned-down version. And it is counting on the Commission to convince Paris and Co. to abandon its idea. As a compromise, the Commission now offers in its non-paper an extension of the Iberian model – that is, a price cap for gas used in power plants to generate electricity. Such a cap for power plant gas would have an immediate effect and would reach consumers, argued a senior Commission official.
The underlying strategy: A package of different measures for lower gas prices – for Russian imports, negotiations with other exporters and now also for power plants – are to act altogether like a general gas price cap, which the 15 states are calling for. Next week, the Commission plans to present an “action plan” – perhaps already on Tuesday, according to reports in Brussels.
What would the diplomatic energy tête-à-tête in Europe be without the Franco-German couplet? France is one of the signatories of the letter, even if Paris “understands our German partners perfectly well” that the already nervous markets should not be thrown even more out of balance. Mais, mais, mais: “The current regulation (the one on the negotiating table) does not answer the price issue at this stage,” says a government adviser in Paris. The goal: a price cap on gas, and not just on Russian gas.
Paris sees “a momentum among the member states that goes in this direction”. But the government also expressly supports the extension of the Iberian mechanism at the European level. This would make it possible “to avoid certain perverse effects, such as the excessive consumption of gas or the transfer of lower prices from one zone of Europe to another,” says the government advisor.
Will a cap on gas prices be on the agenda for President Emmanuel Macron’s meeting with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Monday? Officially, the French leader is traveling to Berlin to take part in the German reunification celebrations, a meeting that will be complemented by a business lunch between the two heads of state. On the agenda are the energy crisis, the war in Ukraine and new sanctions against Russia.
Mais, mais, mais. Emmanuel Macron’s visit to Berlin comes two days before Olaf Scholz will head to Madrid. His trip has the unspoken goal of increasing pressure on Paris to resume construction work on the MidCat pipeline. This is the gas pipeline that is to connect the Iberian Peninsula with the rest of the European continent via a route through France. Critics accuse Paris of throwing obstacles in the way of the project to protect its nuclear industry.
It is worth remembering here that last Tuesday France’s Secretary of State for European Affairs, Laurence Boone, met with her Portuguese counterpart Tiago Antunes in Paris. A sign that Paris may have a change of heart? Definitely not. “Our position on MidCat has not changed,” the government adviser said. “Our conviction is unchanged that it is an extremely difficult construction site that will take six to seven years to complete. Also, the project would be expensive, about €100 million.”
The question is whether a compromise between a gas price cap and the resumption of MidCat construction work is possible.
Members of the European Parliament are not sleeping either. They will travel to Strasbourg, where the start of trilogues awaits them in particular, which will deal with the expansion of renewable energies in the European Union – or RED III in Brussels jargon – as well as energy efficiency (EED).
The trilogue on RED III is scheduled for October 6. As this is the first meeting, the various parties will present their respective positions, which means that the negotiations will not really begin until the negotiators meet again afterward. One particular point: rapporteur Markus Pieper (CDU) submitted amendments to the Commission’s text to ensure more flexibility in the awarding of permits. These amendments will be voted on next week in Strasbourg.
On the same day, also on October 6, the trilogue on the EED will be held. The debates that preceded the adoption of the text in the European Parliament showed a broad consensus, not only between the different political groups, but also between MEPs and the European Commission. In the words of one member of parliament, the unknown factor will be the Council’s position.
EU energy ministers are meeting today to decide on emergency measures to counter rising energy prices. For the Czech presidency, it is already the third extraordinary Council meeting: “And I’m not sure it will be the last, as the situation is not necessarily improving,” a senior EU official told Europe.Table. A letter to the EU Commission in which 15 member states call for a gas price cap caused a stir in the run-up to the meeting. Paris also wants the cap, unlike Berlin. France’s President Emmanuel Macron is less open to the MidCat pipeline, which in turn Chancellor Olaf Scholz approves of. In her column “What’s Cooking in Brussels” this week, Claire Stam takes you on a ride on the energy carousel.
In France, it is not only rising prices that are bringing people to the streets. Above all, it is Macron’s planned pension reform bill that is causing an uproar. Thousands of people protested throughout the country yesterday. But Macron wants to get his way – not least to prove his reputation as a reformer. The risk is high that the plan will be rejected in the National Assembly because Macron no longer has an absolute majority. That is why he will have to make concessions, as Tanja Kuchenbecker analyzes.
Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Bosnia and Herzegovina once again shifted into the public spotlight. The Balkans are of “strategic importance” for Germany, said German Chancellor Olaf Scholz during a trip through the region in the summer. But Bosnia-Herzegovina struggles with a complicated and fragile government system: almost 30 years after the Dayton Peace Agreement, it is still in the grip of nationalist elites from the three largest ethnic groups. On Sunday, the Balkan country will hold elections. Stephan Israel took a look at the situation in the run-up to the elections.
France often sees nationwide protests in the fall. This year it was only a matter of time. On Thursday, strikes and rallies were held against President Emmanuel Macron’s planned pension reform and rising prices. Unions called for nationwide strikes, which affected long-distance trains, mass transit, schools and hospitals, among others. “Raise salaries, not the retirement age,” is the slogan of the unionists.
Paris tried to defuse potential protests against inflation with billions in aid and an energy price cap more than other European countries – the government’s fear of a new protest movement like the yellow vests was too great. But the planned pension reform bill provided further fuel for protests. It is to be discussed this fall, presented before February and voted on in parliament before coming into force in July 2023 at the latest. The plan is to raise the official retirement age by four months per year from 62 to 65 till 2031. The number of years paid in to receive a full pension is also up for debate.
Although the pension reform is an explosive matter, Macron is determined to stick with it despite the energy crisis. He stressed that France needed money for health care and schools. But another reason weighs more heavily: Since his re-election, he no longer seems as radiant as before. During his first term in office, he inspired enthusiasm in Europe with his euphoric proposals for the renewal of the EU. But things have been quiet around him for some time now. People in France say he needs to prove his dynamism once again to find a new élan.
Macron initially wanted to advance quickly with the project. But then he changed his mind and postponed the concrete presentation of the reform. He made the decision at a dinner with the most important ministers, who urged caution. Nevertheless, the project is to be advanced quickly. The president now relies increasingly on consultation with the social partners and the parliamentary groups of the other parties to define the broad lines, because he knows that pension reform will be met with much criticism.
In recent weeks, the reform also caused tensions within the ruling party. Now the head of state is counting on everyone to agree to the project and is thus taking a little more time. A long professional career and hard work are to be taken into account in the project, but also an increase of the minimum pension. With this, the government wants to meet the demands of the unions and the left-wing parties. The stakes are high for Macron: He has to unite his own ranks and prove to France and observers around the world that he has lost none of his strength.
The risk that the reform will be rejected in the National Assembly is high, because Macron no longer holds an absolute majority since the parliamentary elections in the summer, but only a relative majority. He also has to offer something to the conservatives, who are more likely to vote in favor of the reform than the left. As a result, the reform could lead to a further shift to the right in Macron’s politics.
Not only parliament, but also the power of the streets can thwart Macron’s plans. It would not be the first time in France that a reform is overturned because protests paralyze France. So far, however, the social partners don’t really seem to be united. Politics professor Dominique Andolfatto of the University of Bourgogne-Franche-Comté is skeptical: “The unions are not united on the tactics of action. A union has yet to be found.” There are too many rivalries between unions, experts say.
Even if the unions still manage to reach an agreement, Macron has nothing to lose, he can only win. He has set out to reform. He must prove his reputation as a reformer. Not only that, but he cannot run again in the next presidential election. Only two consecutive terms are allowed in France. So Macron might well go through with his plans – even in the face of opposition. After the yellow vests, the pandemic and the Ukraine war, he is a seasoned crisis manager by now.
The nation’s citizens vote with their feet every day. Last year alone, 170,000 residents of Bosnia and Herzegovina left their homes, out of a population of 3.5 million. On Sunday, new parliaments will be elected in the torn country and the leadership of the entities will be selected. There is little hope that the outcome of the elections will change the misery and put a stop to the exodus.
Almost 30 years after the end of the war and the Dayton Peace Agreement, the former Yugoslav republic is still in the grip of nationalist elites from the three largest ethnic groups, the Muslim Bosniaks, the Bosnian Serbs and Croats. It is an ethnocracy in which posts are distributed according to ethnicity and party affiliation and politicians fill their pockets, while the majority of the population struggles to make ends meet on average salaries of €800 and inflation of 16 percent.
The election campaign progressed correspondingly apathetically. In Dayton, the international community brought an end to the conflict after 100,000 dead and millions of displaced persons, but simultaneously left the country with an unsustainable government structure. Elections are held at the federal level and in the two entities, the Bosniak-Croat Federation and the Republika Srpska. In addition, there is the special district of Brčko, which is subordinate to the overall state. Up for election are 14 separate parliaments, 5 presidents, hundreds of deputies and 136 ministers.
Most recently, Russia’s war against Ukraine shifted the focus to the Western Balkan states, the economic woes and the political vacuum. Russia, but also China and Turkey, have used the vacuum to exert political and economic influence in the Balkans. For the first time since the withdrawal of the German armed forces a good ten years ago, the German government decided in the summer to once again deploy 50 soldiers to Bosnia-Herzegovina for the security operation EUFOR (European Union Force) Althea, also partly in anticipation of possible tensions surrounding the elections on Sunday.
Milorad Dodik, strongman of the Serb entity, repeatedly causes unrest, most recently in his role as a member of the three-member presidency of the federal state and now again as a candidate for the presidency of Republika Srpska. At the end of 2021, Dodik threatened to leave the joint institutions and secede from the Bosnian Serb Republic. The US government subsequently imposed sanctions on the politician. Dodik is undermining the federal state and has set up parallel structures in Republika Srpska, the US government said in its statement. The separatist activities served to divert attention from corruption. Dodik allegedly used his position to amass a personal fortune through bribery, kickbacks and other forms of corruption. Within the EU, Hungary avoided similar punitive measures. Milorad Dodik openly supports Russia’s war against Ukraine and visited Vladimir Putin in Moscow ten days ago, not for the first time.
It cannot be ruled out that Dodik, despite Moscow’s support, will lose the elections to a rival, albeit a slightly more moderate nationalist. The dominant nationalist parties of the Bosnian Croats and Bosniaks play a not much less destructive role. Christian Schmidt, former minister of agriculture under Angela Merkel and a longtime member of the German Bundestag, is right in the middle. Merkel had still pushed the conservative through for the post of High Representative (OHR) in Sarajevo, a kind of governor in the Bosnian semi-protectorate.
Christian Schmidt recently caused a stir beyond the country’s borders with an angry outburst about Bosnia’s political class. The OHR can theoretically enact or annul laws and remove politicians from office. Schmidt’s predecessors, however, have been very reluctant to use the so-called Bonn powers in recent years. Almost 30 years after the end of the war, the majority of experts and observers believe that the time has come to abolish the OHR.
Others argue, not wrongly, that without Christian Schmidt, the weekend elections could not take place. The parties themselves failed to agree on a law to organize and finance them in the run-up to the elections. The total paralysis of the institutions is in the interest of the nationalists on all sides, in order to secure sinecures and work toward a division of the country in the longer term.
In 2003, the EU held out the prospect of accession to all six Balkan states. However, Bosnia-Herzegovina, like Kosovo, has not even been granted candidate status. As an ethnocracy and with a dysfunctional government, the chances are not looking good for the country. Those who do not belong to any of the three ethnic groups have no passive voting rights, a fact that the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg already criticized many years ago.
The Balkans are of “strategic importance” for Germany, said German Chancellor Olaf Scholz during a trip through the region in the summer. However, in order for Bosnia to live up to this importance, the Dayton constitution urgently needs to be revised. However, both Bosnia and the international community, which is the guarantor of the Dayton Peace Agreement, lack the political strength to undertake such an overhaul.
Europe’s 27 energy ministers will meet today in the Justus Lipsius Building – not far from the famous (but not as good) Maison Antoine, which has already served countless “cornets de frites” to weary diplomats. For the Czech presidency, it will be the third extraordinary Council meeting since July 1. “And I’m not sure it will be the last, as the situation is not necessarily improving,” says a senior EU official.
What has Brussels abuzz is a letter to the EU Commission signed by 15 member states calling for a gas price cap. “I see that these 15 member states are growing increasingly nervous about what they perceive as a lack of response from the European Commission on this issue,” the official said. “But some member states continue to oppose this measure.” The countries in question are from Central and Eastern Europe, but also the very economic and political heavyweight Germany. So the official adds teasingly, “But we are doing everything to please Germany.”
But the German government fears that a gas price cap would create the wrong incentives. It favors a price brake, the toned-down version. And it is counting on the Commission to convince Paris and Co. to abandon its idea. As a compromise, the Commission now offers in its non-paper an extension of the Iberian model – that is, a price cap for gas used in power plants to generate electricity. Such a cap for power plant gas would have an immediate effect and would reach consumers, argued a senior Commission official.
The underlying strategy: A package of different measures for lower gas prices – for Russian imports, negotiations with other exporters and now also for power plants – are to act altogether like a general gas price cap, which the 15 states are calling for. Next week, the Commission plans to present an “action plan” – perhaps already on Tuesday, according to reports in Brussels.
What would the diplomatic energy tête-à-tête in Europe be without the Franco-German couplet? France is one of the signatories of the letter, even if Paris “understands our German partners perfectly well” that the already nervous markets should not be thrown even more out of balance. Mais, mais, mais: “The current regulation (the one on the negotiating table) does not answer the price issue at this stage,” says a government adviser in Paris. The goal: a price cap on gas, and not just on Russian gas.
Paris sees “a momentum among the member states that goes in this direction”. But the government also expressly supports the extension of the Iberian mechanism at the European level. This would make it possible “to avoid certain perverse effects, such as the excessive consumption of gas or the transfer of lower prices from one zone of Europe to another,” says the government advisor.
Will a cap on gas prices be on the agenda for President Emmanuel Macron’s meeting with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Monday? Officially, the French leader is traveling to Berlin to take part in the German reunification celebrations, a meeting that will be complemented by a business lunch between the two heads of state. On the agenda are the energy crisis, the war in Ukraine and new sanctions against Russia.
Mais, mais, mais. Emmanuel Macron’s visit to Berlin comes two days before Olaf Scholz will head to Madrid. His trip has the unspoken goal of increasing pressure on Paris to resume construction work on the MidCat pipeline. This is the gas pipeline that is to connect the Iberian Peninsula with the rest of the European continent via a route through France. Critics accuse Paris of throwing obstacles in the way of the project to protect its nuclear industry.
It is worth remembering here that last Tuesday France’s Secretary of State for European Affairs, Laurence Boone, met with her Portuguese counterpart Tiago Antunes in Paris. A sign that Paris may have a change of heart? Definitely not. “Our position on MidCat has not changed,” the government adviser said. “Our conviction is unchanged that it is an extremely difficult construction site that will take six to seven years to complete. Also, the project would be expensive, about €100 million.”
The question is whether a compromise between a gas price cap and the resumption of MidCat construction work is possible.
Members of the European Parliament are not sleeping either. They will travel to Strasbourg, where the start of trilogues awaits them in particular, which will deal with the expansion of renewable energies in the European Union – or RED III in Brussels jargon – as well as energy efficiency (EED).
The trilogue on RED III is scheduled for October 6. As this is the first meeting, the various parties will present their respective positions, which means that the negotiations will not really begin until the negotiators meet again afterward. One particular point: rapporteur Markus Pieper (CDU) submitted amendments to the Commission’s text to ensure more flexibility in the awarding of permits. These amendments will be voted on next week in Strasbourg.
On the same day, also on October 6, the trilogue on the EED will be held. The debates that preceded the adoption of the text in the European Parliament showed a broad consensus, not only between the different political groups, but also between MEPs and the European Commission. In the words of one member of parliament, the unknown factor will be the Council’s position.
