The European Court of Justice (ECJ) has struck down a challenge from Hungary and Slovakia over the bloc’s mandatory refugee quota policy. The ruling is a victory for Brussels, Paris and Berlin. The EU’s top court on Wednesday dismissed a challenge by Slovakia and Hungary over the bloc’s mandatory refugee quota program, an issue that…
Berlin: Chancellor Angela Merkel appeared to hold her ground in a television debate ahead of German elections, under attack from her Social Democrat (SPD) rival on refugee policy, ties with Turkey and her handling of US President Donald Trump. Merkel was some 14 points ahead of Martin Schulz in opinion polls before the debate. A…
The trauma of conflict is so overpowering that people often do not wish to return home. They deserve a humane response. Two years ago this month, the image of Aylan, a Kurdish toddler washed up on one of Turkey’s sandy beaches, shocked the world. The Kurdi family were part of the large wave of Syrian…
Two years ago, Chancellor Angela Merkel uttered her now famous refugee crisis mantra, “we can do this.” She no longer uses that phrase, but it still speaks volumes about Germany, says DW’s Christoph Strack. “A year like that cannot and should not ever happen again,” Angela Merkel tells her supporters at campaign appearances around the…
Under a new system, African leaders have agreed to register ‘vulnerable’ would-be migrants before they can seek asylum in Europe. More than 1.5 million migrants have surged into Europe since 2015. Now European leaders and their African counterparts are working to stop the next mass migration before it starts. In Paris on Monday, the leaders…
With re-election a month away, German chancellor says she’d do it all ‘the same way again’ while urging other EU countries to step up. Despite the massive problems that allowing hundreds of thousands of refugees into her country over the past two years have caused her, German Chancellor Angela Merkel told the Welt am Sonntag…
A knife-wielding man has been shot dead in the center of Brussels after authorities said he attacked a group of soldiers. The prosecutor’s office confirmed the soldiers shot and killed the man in the Belgian capital. The incident is being treated as a terrorist attack. The man shouted “Allahu Akbar” (“God is great” in Arabic)…
The war cycles continue to ramp-up across the globe. And this latest wave of geopolitical unrest continues to rise at an unsettling pace. Just like my mentor and friend, Larry Edelson, predicted. Long before Larry passed away early this year, he wrote about these cycles. How they are accelerating and coming together in a way…
AFTER the United Nations lifted sanctions imposed on Libya in 2003, Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi set off to improve relations with Europe. He knew that the two most important cards he held were oil money and migration. He knew that France was looking for yet another market for its arms industry and he knew that…
Publication of action plan for governments is response to what Vatican sees as one of biggest global challenges of 21st century. Pope Francis has issued a 20-point action plan to governments on refugees and migrants to try to galvanise their response to an issue seen by the Vatican as one of the biggest global challenges…