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Published on 23 November 2012 at 10:50

With the EU’s 27 member states still struggling to reconcile their positions, the success of the extraordinary European Council summit on the 2014-2020 budget is hanging in the balance. The common agricultural policy, structural funds and the British rebate are the main bones of contention. Spain, which will become a net contributor in 2013, runs the risk of losing 20 billion euros of agricultural and cohesion funds.

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European disunion – La Razón

“The EU is expected to have a trillion euros to spend between 2014 and 2020. But there are many ongoing disputes over the question of where and how that money will be used. The threat of deadlock is everywhere”, notes the Viennese daily, with strongest

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Veto! – Die Presse

“It is not that important how many billions we [Poles] will eventually get, but also on what conditions”, writes the business daily identifying the “hidden bombs” in the new EU budget including, among others, a reduced EU participation in EU projects (from 90% to 75%), the scrapping of VAT refunds on EU funded projects, and “macroeconomic conditionality” — i.e. EU funding conditional on following Union economic prescriptions. All of these elements would make future EU structural fund projects less accessible to the Polish government, entrepreneurs and institutions.

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Hidden bombs under EU budget – Dziennik Gazeta Prawna

In the run-up to the 25 November regional election in Catalonia, the Swedish daily takes a close look at separatist movements across Europe: in Scotland, Flanders, the Basque Country, and “Padania” (Italy). In their refusal to pay for poor regions elsewhere in their countries, these movements “are threatening to divide Europe”, wrties the newspaper.

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Europe’s new countries - if we let them choose – Dagens Nyheter

Romania’s Superior Council of Magistrates, which guarantees the independence of the judiciary system, has issued a negative opinion on the candidates proposed by Justice Minister, Mona Pivniceru, for the posts of attorney general and chief prosecutor on the National Anticorruption Directorate. The magistrates’ opinion, which is not consultative, is confirmation that the minister, who proposed to appoint inexperienced candidates with no judicial competency to key posts, has failed her first important test.

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Major Ministry Justice failure: nominations for senior legal posts refused – România libera

Following the publication by the controversial artists’ collective Ztohoven of telephone numbers belonging to MPs, ministers and even the president, Czech politicians have received an avalanche of rude anonymous messages and in some cases death threats. Ztohoven rose to prominence when it simulated an atomic explosion in a pirated Czech weather newscast, but now, the newspaper insists, "they have crossed the line."

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Farce or lynching? Politicians confronted by perversity – Lidové noviny

In the wake of a vote on 18 November, the two candidates for the presidency of France’s centre-right Union for a Popular Movement (UMP), Jean-François Copé and François Fillon, have become involved in a vicious battle to see who will take over from former president Nicolas Sarkozy as party chief. Meanwhile, a judge subjected Sarkozy to a 12-hour grilling on 22 November on the secret financing of the UMP by the former owner of l’Oréal, Liliane Bettencourt.

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Headless right – Libération

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