Search Results for: Spain

BY KEITH NUTHALL
POLITICAL pressure applied by the European Union (EU) on its Member States to improve the environmental performance of their water sectors is failing to achieve the desired results, according to a report from the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF).…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has launched infringement proceedings against Belgium, Germany, Greece, Spain, France, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Portugal for failing to implement the package of measures approved last year to liberalise the European Union (EU) telecommunications sector.

Brussels noted that only Britain, Denmark, Ireland, Italy, Austria, Finland, and Sweden had implemented the EU’s framework, authorisations, access and universal service directives into their national legislation by this month (NOTE: OCTOBER).…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has released details of a deal struck with the Ivory Coast that will allow European Union (EU) fishing boats access to its rich tropical fish reserves this year and next. It has asked EU ministers to approve a deal allowing 600 GRT of Spanish demersal vessels to fish of the west African country, along with 18 tuna seiners from France and 21 from Spain; five Portuguese and 15 Spanish surface longliners and seven pole-and-line tuna vessels from France and five from Spain.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
LEGAL final warning letters have been sent by the European Commission to Britain, Belgium, Germany, Greece, France, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Finland, Spain and Sweden, calling on them to swiftly implement a directive guaranteeing consumer protection when insurance companies are wound up.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE GOVERNMENTS of Ireland, Spain and Greece are being threatened with legal action at the European Court of Justice (ECJ) by the European Commission for allegedly failing to set fines for industries continuing to use banned ozone depleting substances such as those used in solvents for cleaning products.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
A UNITED Nations (UN) Convention against Transnational Organised Crime has come into force, imposing a duty on ratifying countries to outlaw membership of an organised criminal group, which it defines legally. So far, said the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), 48 countries have ratified it, including Monaco, Nigeria, Serbia & Montenegro, Peru, Spain, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Canada, Philippines, Tajikistan, Albania, France, Argentina, Mexico, Turkey, China, Norway and Afghanistan.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
UPSET and concern has been caused amongst European utilities by the extension agreed last week of a European Union (EU) system of minimum tax rates for mineral oils to all energy products, including electricity and natural gas. From the New Year, these products will attract minimum indirect taxes (excluding VAT), with the rates detailed in the directive.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
EUROPEAN Union competition Commissioner Mario Monti has called for close cooperation between international business regulators such as the European Commission and their opposite numbers in national governments and in north America. Speaking to the World Forum on Energy Regulation, in Rome, Monti said that by combining their efforts, competition authorities would “achieve more than each would be able to achieve on its own.”…

BY MONICA DOBIE, in Paris
FRENCH tobacconists held a one-day national strike on Monday (20-10) in protest of the recent tax hikes on tobacco products. Some 88 per cent of the country’s 34,000 state-run tobacco shops closed their doors or refused to sell cigarettes because of a recent 20 per cent price increase, the second hike this year.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
THE EUROPEAN Commission’s (EC) proposals for the EU tobacco regime, published in detail last month (September), essentially recognise that subsidised tobacco growing in Europe on any significant scale is now coming to an end. If these plans are put in place it seems likely that in little more than three years’ time the only tobacco grown in the EU will be to serve small niche markets.…