German Chancellor Angela Merkel and her rebellious interior minister have reached a compromise on a refugee dispute that threatened to disintegrate her coalition government.

Interior Minister Horst Seehofer, the leader of Bavaria’s Christian Social Union (CSU), told reporters after five hours of talks on Monday that he would maintain his post, saving Germany’s fragile government coalition.

He had threatened on Sunday to resign if he did not reach a deal with Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU) on refugees.

“After intensive discussions between the CDU and CSU, we have reached an agreement on how we can in future prevent illegal immigration on the border between Germany and Austria,” Seehofer said late on Monday evening as he left the CDU’s Berlin headquarters.

Under the compromise, the refugees who have already applied for asylum in other European Union countries will be held in transit centers on the border while Germany negotiates bilateral deals for their return.

Merkel sounded pleased with the compromise.

“The spirit of partnership in the European Union is preserved and at the same time, an important step to order [has been taken],” the German chancellor said.

Merkel’s CDU relies on the CSU to maintain power through a coalition. The CDU/CSU bloc took 33 percent of the votes in September 2017 elections.

In March, Merkel’s conservative alliance (the CDU/CSU bloc) and the Social Democratic Party (SPD) reached a coalition deal after weeks of fierce negotiations that saw Merkel relinquish the key ministry of finance, among other concessions, further weakening her hold on the government.

Both the CDU and SPD performed poorly in the general elections last year. The SPD initially resisted going into a coalition with the CDU but relented after Merkel failed to reach a deal with two lesser-known parties.

Merkel’s 2015 decision to open the doors to over a million refugees, many fleeing war in the Middle East, fueled the rise of anti-immigration parties, including the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which now threatens to unseat the CSU in regional elections scheduled for October.

Europe has faced its worst refugee crisis since World War II. The continent has been hit since 2014 by an unprecedented influx of refugees fleeing conflict-ridden zones in North Africa and the Middle East, in particular Syria.

Source: Presstv

British Prime Minister Theresa May hopes parliamentarians will support her proposal to offer them a say over a Brexit deal, according to her spokesman.

The prime minister cannot accept a competing proposal from Britain’s House of Lords because it would weaken the government’s authority to secure the best possible deal with the EU, the spokesman said on Tuesday, before a showdown in parliament over her plans to leave the European Union.

“We cannot accept the amendment on (a) meaningful vote agreed in the Lords. Agreeing to amendable motions would allow parliament to direct the government on its approach to exiting the EU, binding the prime minister’s hands and making it harder to secure a good deal for the UK,” he told reporters.

May has said that it is essential to ensure that parliament could not block Brexit.

On Sunday, May defended her way of passing the legislation that will pull Britain out of the European Union. On Tuesday, May defused a rebellion in parliament over her Brexit plans after she was forced to compromise and hand lawmakers greater control over Britain’s exit from the bloc.

May held talks with more than 14 Tory rebels in her Commons office that lasted 11 hours, giving them personal assurances that she would agree to the broad thrust of their proposals.

The premier’s concession may mean lawmakers could have more power if she fails to seal a Brexit deal, possibly resulting in a softer approach to Britain’s divorce. However, presently, MPs will not be able to send the government back into negotiations if they refuse to accept an agreement with the bloc.

The British government has faced fierce criticism both at home and by the EU for its lack of clarity on its Brexit strategy.

In Britain’s 2016 referendum, 52 percent, or 17.4 million people, voted to leave the EU while 48 percent, or 16 million, voted to stay.

Source: Presstv

The European Union is threatening to nullify any EU-UK security partnership following Britain’s exit from the bloc if the UK leaves the European Court of Human Rights.

Under plans suggested by Brussels, the EU will trigger a “guillotine clause” that will cancel any post-Brexit security partnership with London to fight crime and terrorism.

In its latest publication on a joint security partnership, the bloc has dismissed a number of the UK’s proposals in order to strike the “closest possible” security pact.

In April, the European Council announced its commitment to “establish a partnership in the field of fighting against terrorism and international crime.”

EU member states want to see the UK-EU security partnership to continue after Brexit, according to one EU diplomat. But, huge differences remain in both London and Brussels’ plans to strike such a partnership.

Both sides have stated that they are determined to find an arrangement where they can freely exchange information and support in order to combat terrorism and other crimes across the EU.

However, Brussels has scrutinized British proposals in the Commission’s latest publication on the Brexit negotiations and has proposed several stipulations for a potential deal.

The Commission demanded that in order to protect “fundamental rights,” Britain will have to remain party to the European Convention of Human Rights.

“We will not repeal or replace the Human Rights Act while the process of Brexit is underway but we will consider our human rights legal framework when the process of leaving the EU concludes,” the document said.

UK Prime Minister Theresa May has been highly critical of the court in the past. The court, based in Strasbourg, France, was established by the European Convention on Human Rights.

Source: Presstv

Italy has plunged into political uncertainty after the president refused to endorse the eurosceptic pick for the post of finance minister, prompting the premier-designate to drop the mandate to form a government and pushing the country to the verge of fresh elections.

President Sergio Mattarella refused on Sunday to accept the nomination for finance minister of Paolo Savona, who had formerly said that the country’s entry into the European Union’s single currency, euro, was a “historic mistake.”

This prompted prime minister-designate Giuseppe Conte to give up his mandate to form a government, said an official from the presidential palace following talks between Mattarella and Conte.

“The uncertainty over our position has alarmed investors and savers both in Italy and abroad,” the president said in a televised speech. “Membership of the euro is a fundamental choice. If we want to discuss it, then we should do so in a serious fashion.”

Under the country’s law, the president is authorized to reject the appointment of a cabinet member.

​Mattarella said he will appoint a technocratic, or non-political, prime minister. His office later said the president has invited Carlo Cottarelli, a former senior director at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), for talks on Monday.

Cottarelli, 64, is widely known at home as “Mr. Scissors” for making cuts to public spending. To become prime minister, he is required to gain the approval of parliament with Five Star and the League holding a majority in both houses.

Italy – a founding member of the European Union — has been without a government since elections on 4 March and is now expected to go to the polls again later this year.

Two populist parties— far-right League and anti-establishment 5-Star Movement – which were trying for form a coalition government, responded with fury to the president’s veto of their choice and accused him of abusing his constitutional powers.

The two parties also slammed the president’s decision as “meddling” by Germany, ratings agencies and financial lobbies.

Some lawmakers within the coalition have even called on the parliament to impeach Mattarella.

League chief Matteo Salvini also threatened mass protests unless early elections were called.

“In a democracy, if we are still in democracy, there’s only one thing to do, let the Italians have their say,” Salvini said.

He also wrote in a Facebook post that “it won’t be an election, it will be a referendum between Italy and those on the outside who want us to be a servile, enslaved nation on our knees.”

Under article 90 of the Constitution, the parliament can demand that the president step down based on a simple majority vote.

If that majority is secured, the constitutional court should then make the final decision on whether to impeach the president.

If it manages to form a government, the coalition would be the first eurosceptic alliance to head a founding member state in EU history.

Five Star Movement and the League have vowed to battle the European Union over its financial and immigration policies. The two have formerly been open to the possibility of Italy holding a referendum on euro.

According to recent polls, the League, which won 17 percent of the vote in March, would surge in any early ballot, while support for 5-Star remained strong on around 35 percent.

Center-left and center-right parties, however, are said to be losing further ground in the face of high unemployment, the sluggish economy and rising poverty.

The center-right Forza Italia Party and the center-left Democratic Party (PD) both censured calls for impeachment, with former PD leader Matteo Renzi saying his party would organize street demonstrations to defend the country’s institutions.

“Today, we need people to say ‘no’ to those who want to break us apart, who make excuses rather than assuming their responsibilities, who are playing on the anxieties of others,” Renzi wrote on Facebook.

The prospect of a eurosceptic government in Rome has concerned European Union leaders such as French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who are pushing for further political and economic integration.

Source: Presstv

Quim Torra, Catalonia’s new separatist leader, was sworn in Thursday during a brief ceremony without central government representatives in which he avoided promising to obey the constitution and pledged instead to follow “the will of the Catalan people”.

The ceremony marks the end of nearly seven months of political limbo in the northeastern Spanish region, which has been under direct rule from Madrid since the central government deposed Catalan president Carles Puigdemont following a failed declaration of independence on October 27.

“I promise to loyally fulfil the duties of the post of regional president being faithful to the will of the Catalan people represented by the Catalan parliament,” Torra said as he was sworn in, using the same formula as his predecessor and mentor Puigdemont.

The 55-year-old did not promise to obey the Constitution nor the statute that regulates Catalonia’s autonomy.
He appeared flanked only by a Catalan flag, without the traditional Spanish flag and portrait of the king that protocol states must be present, in a small side-room of the regional government building in Barcelona.

Spanish Foreign Minister Alfonso Dastis criticised the ceremony, saying it done “on the sly”, as if Torra “were a second-rate president”.

The hardline separatist Torra was handpicked by Puigdemont, who is currently in Berlin awaiting potential extradition to Spain, where he faces jail on charges of rebellion and misuse of public funds.

He has stressed he is merely a “caretaker president” as he awaits the return of Puigdemont, whom he considers the “legitimate” leader, and has pledged to keep fighting for independence from Spain.

Torra’s swearing-in ceremony only lasted a few minutes and the central government decided not to send any representatives in a sign of tensions between the two.There were no representatives of political parties or civil society either.

As a deferential gesture towards Puigdemont, Torra did not put on the medallion that regional presidents usually wear when they are sworn in.Now Torra needs to form a government, a prerequisite for Madrid to lift direct rule.

But this isn’t assured as Torra has said he wants to reintegrate deposed regional ministers into his government, many of whom are either in preventative custody for their role in the secession drive or in self-exile like Puigdemont.

If the Spanish government decides this is illegal, it could maintain direct rule over the region as requested by center-right party Ciudadanos, whose hardline stance towards the Catalan crisis has resounded in Spain.

The party is now threatening to overtake Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy’s Popular Party in regional and municipal elections next year.

In the more immediate future, however, Rajoy needs the support of the Basque Nationalist Party (PNV) in parliament to approve the 2018 budget.

The PNV wants Madrid to lift direct rule as it strongly supports regional autonomy and is sympathetic to the Catalan cause.
Caught between the two, Rajoy has pledged to watch Torra closely and maintain control over regional finances to avoid public money going to any separatist initiatives, and has also said he is willing to meet the Catalan leader.

Meanwhile, another battle is going on in the courts, with 25 separatist leaders being investigated for rebellion or other offences, nine of whom are in preventative custody and another seven abroad.

On Wednesday, a Belgian judge rejected the extradition request of three former Catalan ministers due to irregularities in the arrest warrants, dealing a blow to Spain.

A court in Germany has also rejected extraditing Puigdemont to Spain for rebellion, a very serious charge that implies violence took place and which many legal experts have discarded.

The court is still considering whether to hand him over to Spain on the lesser charge of misuse of public funds.
Faced with these setbacks, Spain’s Supreme Court has said it is was considering replacing rebellion with sedition, which does not imply violence took place and is less severe.

(Source: AFP)

The Scottish parliament has decisively voted against the United Kingdom’s legislation on departure from the European Union (EU), placing London on course for a major constitutional dispute with Edinburgh and the further postponement of Brexit.

The Scottish lawmakers rejected British Prime Minister Theresa May’s EU Withdrawal Bill by 93 votes to 30 on Tuesday.

Labour, the Liberal Democrats and Scottish Greens backed First Minister Nicola Sturgeon’s party members in rejecting the divorce bill, arguing that it would restrict Holyrood’s powers.

The vote is not legally binding but it will force London to make a high-risk decision and assert power over Edinburgh or make further concessions to the Scottish government to avoid a crisis.

May’s disregard for the vote could fuel Sturgeon’s demands for a second referendum on Scottish independence and provide her Scottish National Party (SNP) with a further justification for staging one.

Britain has been at loggerheads with the devolved nations – Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales – on how power would be shared after the Britain’s separation from the 28-member bloc.

Speaking after the Tuesday vote, Scotland’s Brexit secretary Mike Russell, called on the UK government to respect the will of the Scottish parliament and find an acceptable solution.

“The Scottish Parliament has now said overwhelmingly that this attempt to undermine devolution is unacceptable,” he said. “The UK government cannot ignore the reality of devolution or try to drown out what this parliament says. They cannot pretend that no motion has been passed.”

A day earlier, Sturgeon warned London against ignoring the Holyrood’s views and said May needed to secure a deal with Edinburgh fast.

“They [UK government] have a decision to make as to whether they are going to ignore the views of the Scottish Parliament or listen to those views and try very hard to get a deal and to close the gap that remains between us,” she said.

In the United Kingdom’s 2016 referendum, 52 percent, or 17.4 million people, voted to leave the EU while 48 percent, or 16 million, voted to stay.

The British government has faced fierce criticism both at home and by the EU for its lack of clarity on its Brexit strategy.

The uncertainty has raised fears that Britain could crash out of the bloc without a trade deal, incurring heavy costs on its domestic economy.

London and Brussels are due to move on to the next stage of Brexit negotiations this year, after reaching agreement in December on exit terms.

Source: Presstv

Spain’s government on Wednesday stepped in to block Carles Puigdemont from being re-appointed president of Catalonia, pressuring the separatist camp to pick another candidate and form a regional government after months of limbo.

Madrid successfully requested the Constitutional Court to cancel a reform voted for last week by Catalonia’s majority separatist parliament that would allow Puigdemont to be appointed president without having to be present.

The court announced on Wednesday evening it had ruled “admissible the appeal of the government” and suspended the reform, which had been temporarily blocked while the court deliberated.

Government spokesman Inigo Mendez de Vigo said earlier the Catalan parliament would not be able to call a session to appoint Puigdemont “at the risk of committing the offence of disobedience”.

Puigdemont’s allies had announced Saturday they would try and have him appointed by May 14.

But they also recognised that if they couldn’t, they would pick an alternative candidate to unblock the political impasse in Catalonia, which was put under direct rule by Madrid on October 27 after a failed secession bid.

That day, Rajoy also sacked Puigdemont and all his ministers after the regional parliament declared independence following a referendum that wasn’t sanctioned by Madrid and was banned by the courts.

He also called snap regional elections for December 21, which separatist parties went on to win, once again getting an absolute majority in parliament.

By then, Puigdemont had already left for Belgium in self-imposed exile.

But since then, all candidates proposed by the separatist camp to lead Catalonia have fallen flat, as they are either abroad and wanted by Spain, or already in prison, charged with rebellion.

Critics of the independence camp have charged they are merely dragging the process out to try and garner sympathy.

Speaking in the Senate on Tuesday, Rajoy slammed the separatists’ attempts to have Puigdemont re-appointed.

He accused them of “having put Catalan politics in an absurd loop in which the personal interests of one person are placed before the collective project of an entire society”.

Catalan separatists, however, say Puigdemont is their legitimate leader as his Together for Catalonia grouping received the most votes out of all separatist parties in the December elections.

They also say the rebellion charge against him and others is disproportionate, and describe those already in jail in Spain — like former Catalan vice president Oriol Junqueras — as “political prisoners”.

Puigdemont is currently in Germany after being detained there in March on a European arrest warrant against him issued by Spain. He was later released on bail.

Source: AFP

Separatists in Spain’s Catalonia region say they will re-nominate self-professed, fugitive leader Carles Puigdemont to head their regional government, a move that would be unacceptable to Madrid.

In October 2017, Catalonia’s pro-independence leaders held a referendum that had been banned by Spain’s central government and declared illegal by the country’s Constitutional Court. Organizers said 90 percent of voters backed secession. Before and during the referendum, Spanish police attempted to prevent the voting and arrested a number of secessionist leaders.

Amid that crackdown, Puigdemont — who unsuccessfully declared independence for Catalonia from Spain late that same month — and four of his ministers fled to Belgium, where authorities refused to extradite the fugitive leaders despite a European arrest warrant. Puigdemont then traveled to Denmark and then Germany. A second warrant has been issued by Madrid to have them extradited. Berlin is considering that request.

Meeting in Berlin on Saturday, pro-independence Catalan politicians vowed to attempt once again to get their former leader reinstalled as president of the Spanish region by May 14 and said they had no intention of holding fresh elections.

“We want to vote on the investiture of @KRLS (Puigdemont), a legitimate president, the one who emerges from the polls with the mandate… before May 14,” Eduard Pujol, a spokesman for the secessionist Junts per Catalunya Party in the regional parliament, said in a tweet.

The announcement came as Catalan separatists were expected to propose a new candidate who would have been acceptable to the government in Madrid.

Pujol added that the secessionists remained loyal to Puigdemont despite previous failed efforts to install him as president.

Catalan lawmakers have until May 22 to form a government; and if they fail to do so, a new election must be held.

This will be the fifth attempt to install a new regional president since the Spanish government imposed direct rule on resource-rich Catalonia. Madrid has already said it will contest a newly-passed legislation that allows members to vote for an absent leader.

Madrid wants Puigdemont, along with the four other former officials, on charges of sedition and rebellion.

A court has normally 60 days to rule on extradition based on the new European arrest warrant.

Catalonia, one of Spain’s wealthiest and most productive regions, is now theoretically under the direct control of the Spanish national government in Madrid. Pro-independence parties won a slim majority after a December 2017 election called by the Spanish government. However, they have since been locked in drawn-out negotiations on forming a government.

Italy is facing a third month of political paralysis after talks between the center-left and the Five Star Movement over a coalition government failed to get off the ground Thursday.

President Sergio Mattarella’s office announced in a statement that a fresh round of consultations would be held at the presidential palace on Monday “to see if the parties have other ideas for a government majority”.

On Sunday, just days after acting Democratic Party leader Maurizio Martina had said he was willing to talk to Five Star head Luigi Di Maio, former premier Matteo Renzi closed the door on any coalition deal with the anti-establishment upstarts.

Renzi stepped down as prime minister after his Democratic Party slumped to third place in the March 4 vote, behind the right-wing coalition led by the nationalist League that won the most seats, and Five Star, which became Italy’s largest single party.

Renzi still wields huge influence among his party’s MPs and senators however, many of whom are hostile to Five Star after it ferociously criticised them when they governed Italy.

At a conference on Thursday the Democratic Party’s national leadership voted unanimously not to engage in government talks with the Five Star Movement.

“With Five Star, the chapter is closed,” declared Martina.

(Source: AFP)

The UK’s two main parties, the ruling Conservatives and the main opposition Labour, are set to lock horns in this year’s local elections across England.

Polling stations across the country will open on Thursday between 7am and 10pm local time and voters will head to the ballots to choose candidates that will take more than 4,000 seats across 150 councils in England.

All the seats in capital London’s 32 boroughs and the metropolitan districts of Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham and Newcastle are also up for grab.

There are no polls in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland.

While Prime Minister Theresa May’s party is hoping to keep its grip over main positions, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn is positive that his party is set to repeat another strong showing like the one they had in last year’s snap general election.

“The biggest elections are going to be in the main cities, particularly London, Birmingham, Newcastle – we’re going to be working very hard on them. In London particularly, they are going to focus on housing,” he said last December, before proceeding to criticize the Tory government’s treatment of local authorities.

“But it’s also emphasizing the way local authorities have been so underfunded by this government that they are all facing real difficulties … this is the product of seven years of austerity,” he argued. “I’m hoping we do very, very well, but I’m not putting a figure on it.”

May called the snap election thinking that it would easily hand her stronger support in parliament but ended up costing her party its decisive majority.

She further embarrassed the Tories and herself by appealing to Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) to form a majority government.

A month before the snap election, however, the Conservatives won 1,900 seats in the local elections, up 558 from the year before, while Labour lost 320 to end up with 1,151.

Source: Presstv