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27 dead in 24 hours – and a quick ceasefire. That was the situation one day after Azerbaijani army soldiers entered Nagorno-Karabakh. Whether the guns really fell silent overnight, as agreed by both sides, is unclear at the moment.
The government in Baku has offered the ethnic Armenian fighters, who are being persecuted as separatists, free passage in exchange for the voluntary surrender of heavy weapons. 5,000 men are said to be entrenched in the villages and communities around Stepanakert.
The escalation in the enclave, which is not recognized under international law, was months in the making – and yet Olaf Scholz and Emmanuel Macron were unable to exert their influence over Azerbaijan’s ruler Ilham Aliyev. A weakness of the EU.
There can only be a diplomatic solution, demanded German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly. The EU and the German government also advocated this in New York. “There will only be a peaceful solution to this conflict if military action is stopped immediately”, Baerbock added.
For our German-speaking readers: All information can be found in a special edition of Security.Table.
Lukas Scheid
Feature
Glyphosate: EU Commission wants to extend approval by ten years
The European Commission yesterday (Wednesday) proposed to EU member states to extend the approval of glyphosate in the European Union by ten years. In doing so, the EU executive recognizes the risks and uncertainties identified by the European Public Health Agency (ECDC) and leaves it up to the states to “pay close attention” to the side effects of glyphosate.
Ten years is more than the last authorization, which was granted for five years, but less than the maximum of 15 years provided for in EU law. “If within those 10 years information emerges that calls into question EFSA’s conclusions or what we have concluded based on our analysis, we can always reconsider the authorization“, a senior EU official added.
In July, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) had assessed a renewed approval of the controversial weedkiller in the European Union as non-critical. However, EFSA pointed to data gaps that left risks to consumers and aquatic plants inadequately assessed. In addition, the authority admitted that information on the toxicity of so-called “cocktail effects” was lacking – this refers to the interaction of glyphosate and active substances that are components of other pesticides.
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