Three days after the European elections and Emmanuel Macron's dissolution of the National Assembly, the French political landscape is a field of ruins.
The announcement by President Emmanuel Macron that he is dissolving the National Assembly and calling snap elections caught me (and the rest of the world, probably) by surprise just two minutes before I went live on TV on Sunday night.
Too often we speak about the surge of 'the far-right' in Europe but we forget this is neither new nor too surprising. The reality is, the far-right is joining the mainstream as we speak.
Today’s 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings is an opportunity to remember a great military victory against the Nazis but also - on the day European elections start - an important reminder to voters of the values that were fought for, which become the basis of the EU.
Enlargement to the East, and to the Western Balkans, is a geostrategic imperative and will require reforms on both sides, writes Paulo Rangel.
Italy’s conservative Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has for months been politically courted by the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP) and recently by far-right leader Marine Le Pen.
After the second EU election debate, everyone talked about von der Leyen leaving the door wide open to Giorgia Meloni’s hard-right Fratelli d’Italia. But does the Commission president also tolerate the party’s questionable stance on LGBTIQ+? Her answer was decidedly ... evasive.
It's a face-off that could shake up the French political landscape. Prime Minister Gabriel Attal will take on the up-and-coming president of the Rassemblement National (RN), Jordan Bardella, in a televised debate on the national TV channel France 2 on Thursday (23 May).
With the European elections around the corner, Europe is confronted with challenges that demand a united front and bold action. But Ursula von der Leyen's promises for swift and decisive action have fallen flat: After five long years, all we have got are sluggish responses that left us wanting more, writes Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann.
Less migration, more manure: For EU purposes, that could have been the motto chosen by the four Dutch right-wing parties that agreed this week on a programme for a new government in the Netherlands. Instead, they went for ‘hope, courage and pride’, preferring to address the Dutch voters.
Austria is charged with political electricity, but it's not because of the upcoming EU elections in June. Bigger events are looming only three months later: the national election that might put the far-right in charge of the Alpine country.
Regards from Sofia, where the author of this Brief has witnessed the first days of the European election campaign and concluded the following: The number one election punching bag is the European Green Deal, and it's no different in many other EU countries.
China’s President Xi Jinping has been received in Serbia and Hungary as the messiah. Only during communism Belgrade and Budapest were so decorated with flags and posters and so many people were bussed to greet the high visitor.
One month before the EU elections, it is useful to look back and see how the nine previous votes have exemplified historical developments and the changing balance of power in our union.
The single market is Europe’s industrial strategy and the right tool for the prosperity and security of our continent. On the basis of the Letta report, liberals call on EU political forces to agree on an action plan for competitiveness, writes Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann.
Ricardo Borges de Castro makes the case that the European election is von der Leyen's to lose, ahead of Monday's (29 April) Spitzenkandidaten debate
As Brussels emerges from a severe case of last week's ‘Lettamania’, the question must be asked: Who will benefit?
It’s a political conundrum that’s been plaguing Europe for a decade, and Croatia is getting a taste of it this week: A parliamentary election in the newest EU member pits a conservative party entrenched in power for almost a decade against a host of fragmented contenders, led by the fledgling Social Democrats.
The parliamentary questions system operated by the European Parliament is a pale imitation of the traditional PQ system, is extraordinarily bureaucratic, operates at a snail’s pace, and produces responses that would not be tolerated in other parliaments, writes Dick Roche.
While the European Commission released its guidelines on how to avoid the abuse of generative artificial intelligence (AI) in June's EU elections, the internet was ablaze with theories that a video intended to show the wellbeing of Kate Middleton, a member of the British Royal Family, was fake and created by AI.
Another EU summit starts today, and as usual, I will spend two days in a newsroom with colleagues from most EU countries, many of whom will ask me what is happening in Bulgaria.
Polls don’t tell the full story of what EU citizens want from upcoming EU elections – and we need to dive deeper into the interplay between Europeans’ views on further EU integration and their takes on specific EU policies, write Bruno Cautrès and Thierry Chopin.
In the space of three weeks, President Emmanuel Macron has declared himself in favour of several rather progressive measures. With EU elections around the corner, is he trying to woo younger and left-wing voters?
Something is really not going well between the EU centre-right and the liberals, who are expected, together with the socialists, to form a pro-EU coalition in the European Parliament after the elections in June.
