Archive

BY MARK ROWE
THE YEAR 2007 will be a significant one for Romania. It is the year that the country is scheduled to join the European Union (EU); it is also the year that Romania’s second nuclear power unit is expected to come on line.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
In another step expected to smooth the distribution of the country’s electricity, the World Bank’s Programmatic Adjustment Loan (PAL) programme for Romania will privatise all six distribution companies. In recent months, four European investors have taken over the companies that form the heart of the Romanian energy sector, in transactions totalling around €2.25 billion.…

BY MONICA DOBIE
A NEWLY discovered monkey has been named after an Internet gambling site, after it offered the highest bid of US$650,000 in the world’s first online species naming auction.

The titi monkey will be called the GoldenPalace.com monkey, sporting a formal name of Callicebus aureipalatii, Latin for Golden Palace.…

BY MONICA DOBIE
*Goldenpalace.com monkey is one foot tall, weighs two pounds and eats fruit.

*It has brown fur with a golden crown, orange throat and cheeks and has a white tip on its tail.

*Like all titi monkeys, they mate for life.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
GILLETTE has lost an appeal at the European Court of Justice (ECJ) against a decision to block its pan-European Union (EU)-registration of the trademark ‘XTREME RIGHT GUARD sport’ for shaving foam, creams and cosmetics. Gillette was appealing against a decision by the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (Trade Marks and Designs) – OHIM – to support opposition from Wilkinson Sword GmbH, which successfully argued the mark would be confused with its ‘WILKINSON SWORD EXTREME’ brand.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Court of Justice’s (ECJ) Court of First Instance has rejected a bid by Spain’s Duarte y Beltrán SA to secure European Union (EU)-wide trademark rights to sell cosmetics, soaps and perfumes under the brand ‘INTEA’. Judges backed the EU’s Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (Trademarks and Designs) -OHIM – in supporting the complaint of Italian rival Mirato SpA.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
AN INTERNATIONAL initiative to raise Asian food safety standards to those required by the European Union (EU) for imports has been launched with the support of the European Commission. It is donating Euro 597,000 to the SELAMAT project to create a network of European and Asian food institutes, swapping information and best practice on meeting EU health-based food regulations.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
BRITISH and French surfers have demonstrated in Brussels pushing the European Parliament to broaden the scope of the European Union bathing water directive to better protect the health of recreational water users. However, they are opposed by the British Canoe Union, which warns that over-tough rules could cause private landowners to close lakes and ponds to the public.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
INTENSE concern in the European Union (EU) about a possible bird flu outbreak has sparked the European Commission into proposing a directive aimed at preparing Europe to fight the disease. EU ministers and the European Parliament have been asked to approve new monitoring controls on weakly pathogenic strains of bird flu, because of concern that they could mutate, become more deadly and maybe jump species to humans.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE FIRST soil atlas of Europe has been published by the European Commission, which includes advice on how to protect soil against erosion and pollution, as well as detailed regional maps of soil types. Welcoming its launch, European Union (EU) research Commissioner Janez Potocnik said: “We definitely undervalue the contribution of soil to our bio-diversity, but unless we protect it better, we will soon realise its importance in the worst possible way – by seeing the problems caused by its loss.…