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Markus Pieper resigns from €17k-a-month role hours before he was due to start amid claims of favouritismEurope live – latest updatesA row threatening to overshadow Ursula von der Leyen’s campaign for a second term as European Commission president has ended after a German colleague in her Christian Democratic Union party quit his new role as her special envoy for small businesses.Markus Pieper resigned from...

Ukraine could receive the first €1bn of interest on the sequestered assets by early JulyEU leaders have agreed in principle to commandeer a large majority of the profits generated from frozen Russian assets and give them to Ukraine.The proposal could generate €3bn (£2.6bn) this year and the first billion could be released to Ukraine by July, the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen,...

European Commission will open office in the territory, made strategically important by rare resources and melting iceThe president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, is heading to Greenland as melting Arctic ice, demand for green-technology raw materials and competition from China increase the territory’s strategic importance.While not in the EU, the autonomous Danish territory is of strong interest to Brussels, especially for...

Members of justice committee say €150m in EU funding went straight to country’s president, Kais SaiedThe European Commission has been accused of “bankrolling dictators” by senior MEPs who have claimed that the €150m it gave to Tunisia last year in a migration and development deal has ended up directly in the president’s hands.A group of MEPs on the human rights, justice and foreign affairs...

Centre-right European People’s party says it wants to create deportation deals with non-EU countries to head off rise of far rightA group of political parties backing Ursula von der Leyen for a second term in one of the most powerful jobs in Brussels at the head of the European Commission is planning to call for further migration reforms, similar to the UK’s Rwanda policy,...

Ukraine’s president met the prime ministers of Italy, Canada and Belgium in a show of unity after recent battlefield defeatsVolodymyr Zelenskiy welcomed western leaders to Kyiv on Saturday on the second anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, declaring that Vladimir Putin “must lose absolutely everything”.Ukraine’s president met the prime ministers of Italy, Canada and Belgium – Giorgia Meloni, Justin Trudeau and Alexander De...

Moussa Faki welcomes Giorgia Meloni’s plan to strengthen relations but says ‘we are not beggars’The chair of the African Union Commission has said “we are not beggars” as the Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, outlined a plan aimed at helping African countries to prosper in return for curbing illegal immigration.Speaking at the much anticipated Italy-Africa summit in Rome, Moussa Faki welcomed Italy’s overtures for...

European Commission president says policymakers have to find a way forward to find lasting solutions for farmersHere are photos from France this morning, where farmers are continuing to block roads.Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission’s president, said today there was a “sense of urgency” that things had to improve for Europe’s agriculture sector.I think we all sense that there is an increasing division...

Then president told European commissioners in 2020 that ‘Nato is dead’ and the US would never defend Europe if it were attackedDonald Trump told the president of the European Commission in 2020 that the US would “never come help” if Europe was attacked and also said “Nato is dead”, a senior European commissioner said.Multiple news outlets said the exchange between Trump and Ursula von...