Search Results for: Dominican Republic

BY ALAN OSBORN
AS recently as 1989 Yugoslavia was the richest and most westernised country in eastern and central Europe and arguably among the more politically stable of them. But then came the collapse. The ethnic fighting of the early 1990s led to breakaways by Slovenia, Croatia, Macedonia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina as independent states in 1992, leaving Serbia and Montenegro as the “Federal Republic of Yugoslavia” under Slobodan Milosevic.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE KEY European Commissioner for Europe’s personnel managers over the next four years will be the Czech Republic’s Vladimir ?pidla, who will become the new European Union (EU) commissioner for employment, social affairs and equal opportunities. Replacing current stand in commissioner Stavros Dimas, of Greece, (who has taken over temporarily from fellow Greek Anna Diamontopoulou), ?pidla…

BY ALAN OSBORN
THE LEGAL web being cast by the European Union (EU) in the fight against money laundering is being tightened still further. A third directive has now been proposed by the European Commission that, among other things, will broaden the definition of money laundering to include not only the concealment or disguise of the proceeds of serious crimes but also the financing of terrorism with either criminal or legally acquired money.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) has provisionally agreed to help the central Asian republic of Tajikstan improve its safe handling of nuclear materials in a wide-ranging cooperation deal. The Tajik government also promised to reform its nuclear and radioactive material legislation so it reflects that in force in the EU.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
DETAILS of the expansion in European Union (EU) import quotas for Kazakhstan steel products because of May’s enlargement of the EU by 10 new member countries have been released by the European Commission. The central Asian republic had a pre-existing steel trade deal with Brussels, guaranteeing its access to EU markets for a range of products.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) Council of Ministers has moved towards creating an effective cross-border gas market in the newly expanded EU, striking political agreement over a regulation on gas networks. It harmonises the conditions for accessing gas transmission infrastructure, specifying third party access, rules on capacity allocation, congestion management and the release of transmission information required for gas providers to use foreign systems.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
WITHIN the newly expanded European Union (EU), Poland is the cheapest country in which to buy a car, although under current trends that honour may not last long. According to the latest European Commission figures, Polish car prices are on average 9% cheaper than those in Finland, the cheapest country using the single European currency.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE DOMINICAN Republic heads the list of countries granted low rate tariff quotas by the USA for sugar and sugar-containing product imports made in 2004-5. It has been allocated a 185,335 tonne quota, followed by Brazil with 152,691 tonnes and Philippines, 142,160.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
REQUIREMENTS on national telecommunications regulators within the European Union (EU) to analyse a list of specific markets to see if controls are required on a dominant operator are to be frozen for 18 months. The European Commission had been due to review this so-called ‘ex ante’ recommendation last month, but has postponed this until December 2005.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
BRITAIN’S tax burden as a proportion of GDP fell sharply in 2002 to 35.8% from 37.3% in 2001, confirming the UK as among the lightest taxed jurisdictions in the European Union (EU). The contrast is especially marked with its key competitors Germany (40.2% in 2002), France (44.2%), and Italy (41.7%), according to the latest available comparative figures from EU statistical agency Eurostat.…