Search Results for: Greece

The European Parliament’s (EP) reputation as a mostly harmless and clean international democratic assembly has taken a serious knock through the ‘Qatargate’ scandal. Keith Nuthall reports.

Belgium’s federal police, working with Belgian prosecutor Michel Claise, have uncovered what they claim is a serious network of graft, where the natural gas-rich Gulf state of Qatar is alleged to have subverted elected European Union (EU) officials.…

Transparency International warned that “conflict creates opportunities for corruption and subverts governments’ efforts to stop it” in unveiling the 2022 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) on January 31, scoring 180 countries worldwide on perceived levels of public sector corruption from 0 (highly corrupt) to 100 (very clean).…

Biomass is under threat as the leading source of renewable energy in the European Union (EU) under controversial proposals to cap use of primary woody biomass and end subsidies by the end of 2026. Bioenergy Europe figures (1) show that 69.6% of biomass energy feedstock used in Europe comes from woody biomass, which are forestry and wood industry residues with the remaining feedstock sourced 18.3% from agricultural biomass and 12.1% biowaste.…

The European Union (EU) is edging towards a digital Euro, one of several jurisdictions worldwide developing a central bank digital currency (CBDC), but what anti-money laundering controls would need to be built into the system and how can this be balanced with data protection and privacy considerations?…

The European Parliament is grappling with the fallout of the Qatargate’ cash-for-influence corruption scandal. Greek socialist MEP Eva Kaili has been replaced as the parliament’s vice-president by a Luxembourg socialist, after Kaili was arrested by Brussels police. Officers allege they found EUR1.5 million cash at her home and that of former MEP Pier Antonio Panzeri, another socialist, from Italy.…

The European Union’s (EU) new ‘Women on Boards’ directive (1) is designed to force change in the EU’s director cohort by requiring that the ‘under-represented sex’ (which could be male on rare female-dominated boards) make up 40% of non-executive directors or 33% of all major company directors.…

The European Parliament is reeling from the so-called ‘Qatargate’ cash-for-influence corruption and money laundering scandal that broke December 9 when Belgian police found over EUR1.5 million (USD1.6 million) cash in raids on locations across Brussels. In a December 15 resolution (1) on the suspicions of corruption by Qatar, passed by 541 votes in favour, two against, and three abstentions, members of the European Parliament (MEPs) agreed to suspend all work related to Qatar, notably on visa liberalisation and an aviation agreement, as well as to deny access to the Parliament for Qatari representatives.…

A key question in any industry is to what extent robotics will be able to replace the human hand. This issue is especially pertinent for textiles and clothing – where sensor-based automation increasingly carries out human tasks such as assessing the feel of textiles and quality control.…

Concern about rapid increases in consumption in heated tobacco and the European Union’s (EU) stated ambition to reduce all tobacco use by 2040 so that less than 5% of the 27 member countries’ 447 million people is pushing EU policymakers towards tightening vaping and e-cigarette controls.…

The Greece higher education sector is sharply increasing the number of English-taught short-term higher education (HE) courses that operate in collaboration with foreign universities. According to Christos Michalakelis, co-founder and president of Study in Greece (SiG), the official organisation promoting internationalisation within Greek HE, short-term courses yielding student academic credits, is a stepping stone “towards internationalising Greek universities”.…