Search Results for: Germany

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has called for the closure of EU coalmines that perform poorly economically, where they have been lavished with state aid paid with the view to them being restructured and turned around.

In its latest report on state aid to the mining industry, (for the year 2000), Brussels adopts an aggressively negative tone about aid paid by national governments to the coal industry, which it claims “is in crisis, despite several years of state aid.”…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
LOCAL authorities in the European Union are unprepared for the introduction of single European currency notes and coins next January, even though they have a crucial role in spreading information among small businesses and community groups, the European Commission has claimed.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
BRUSSELS is always looking for big ideas by which it can justify its existence to a doubting public and one of the latest of these is the concept of a European Research Area. This idea is that Europe – with its patchwork of nations and national research units – should coordinate its academics and researchers, making sure that they do not duplicate their efforts, rather dovetailing them with a single European goal in mind.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
A LACK of coordination amongst EU Member States’ research teams regarding the study of BSE has been revealed by a new European inventory of previous work and that in progress, collated by the European Commission.

It has highlighted areas where better links between national research programmes is required.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
THE EUROPEAN Union has voiced “disappointment and concern” at a decision by the US Department of Commerce to impose provisional countervailing duties on imports of low enriched uranium from the EU.

European Commission officials said that the case concerned uranium that had been processed for use in electricity generation.…

BY SWINEETHA DIAS WICKRAMANAYAKE
DEMAND for ostrich leather, particularly from south Asia, has been one the result of the recent spread of foot-and-mouth disease across the globe, notably to Britain, Argentina, Uruguay, South Africa, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. The problems have created a scarcity in the market for bovine leather and there have been industry reports from India saying that there has been a resulting good demand for printed leathers, especially ostrich leather print, reflecting positive opinions that it is distinctive and elegant.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission’s long running bid at the European Court of Justice to undermine the series of bilateral ‘open skies’ agreements struck between individual EU Member States, and the USA has taken a further step forward, with the opening of oral proceedings.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has decided to take France to the European Court of Justice, for failing to implement the EU gas directive before its August 2000 deadline. Paris has pointed out that draft legislation has been adopted, but Brussels asked the ECJ to order it to comply, because there is no date for it to be approved by the national assembly.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE CASE brought by the European Commission against the Philip Morris and RJ Reynolds corporations for their alleged involvement in cigarette smuggling has opened at the US District Court for the Eastern District of New York. The Commission has now been formally joined in the case by Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Belgium, the Netherlands, Finland, Luxembourg, who have given mandate Commission lawyers to represent them.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
DEFINITIVE anti-dumping duties have been imposed by the European Union on aluminium foil exported by China and Russia. The EU Council of Ministers said that the duties would apply on imports of aluminium foil of a thickness of not less than 0.009 mm and not more than 0.018 mm, not backed, not further worked than rolled and in reels of a width not exceeding 650 mm.…