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The word after talks with Italy's president today is that more time is needed for the Five Star Movement and the League to finalize details of a new government program and agree on the name of a new prime minister. Leaders Luigi Di Maio of Five Star and Matteo Salvini of the League have agreed not to be prime minister, another person will be named. Reuters quoted Di Maio: "We agree that we have to move quickly, but we are writing what will be the government program for the next five years. It's very important for us to do it...

The two outsider parties, the Five Star Movement and the League, have reached agreement on a new government in Italy and plan to name a prime minister and cabinet within days. They have also reached agreement on a common set of policies which include standing up for Italy within the European Union seeking renegotiation of EU rules that hurt the country. A crackdown on illegal immigration with increased deportations, a flat tax to help individuals and businesses, a repeal of the 2011 pension reform law and opposition to new sanctions on Russia are also part of the agenda of a...

In an op-ed published by The New York Times on Friday, two men who served on the staff of the National Security Council in the Obama White House openly called for traditional American allies in Europe to take the side of the world’s largest state sponsor of terrorism over the leader of their own country. According to Steven Simon and Jonathan Stevens, President Donald Trump’s decision to pull the United States out of the Iran nuclear deal is an insult so grievous that European governments should consider pulling their ambassadors out of Washington — and expelling American ambassadors from their...

Preparations are underway for the grand opening of the new United States embassy to Israel in Jerusalem. While the President won’t be able to attend as he prepares for his summit with North Korea, Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump have arrived to do the honors along with a number of other delegates. But not everyone is quite so thrilled with this development, particularly in some parts of the European Union. They were preparing to put forward a resolution condemning the embassy move, delivering a statement which was explicitly designed to “embarrass and isolate the Trump administration” ahead of the ceremony....

European Union, USA March 7 2018 The EU’s General Data Protective Regulation (“GDPR”) has been a popular topic of late. Fisher Phillips’ Employment Privacy Blog has covered the evolution of this regulation, starting with the roll back of the previous “safe harbor” regime, as well as providing updates to GDPR compliance standards, and training recommendations. As if to highlight the seriousness with which the EU is pursuing this directive, the GDPR has even made a recent appearance in Supreme Court arguments on Tuesday. United States v. Microsoft, No. 17-2, raised the issue of whether the United States may issue a...

"Italy's anti-establishment Five Star Movement and the right-wing League party say they have made significant steps to forming a government, more than two months after a general election...." BBC News report May 10th, 2018 "Let me say I've worked with both of these parties in the European Parliament. Both of these groups and I've been president of those groups and these people have served with me and I really want to see this coalition forming...." Nigel Farage on "The Nigel Farage Show"-LBC May 10th, 2018 There was an "inconclusive" result in Italy's general election on March 4th wit the standard...

US President Donald Trump’s pullout from the Iran nuclear deal has put Europe under pressure to salvage the 2015 multilateral agreement. But does the EU have what it takes to stand up to US sanctions? The day after Trump announced his long-dreaded decision to withdraw from the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, EU members were hammering out measures to try to protect European firms doing business in Iran from US sanctions. The JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action) – as the Iran deal is formally known – was signed between Iran, the US, Russia, China, Britain, France, Germany and the EU....

Europe Day, observed on May 9 each year, marks the presentation of the Schuman Declaration in 1950, which proposed the creation of a European Coal and Steel Community, the forerunner to the European Union. What was the idea behind the community? The idea of the community was that its founding members – France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg – would pool their coal and steel resources and create a common market for them by lifting import and export duties. The idea was partly economic: French foreign minister Robert Schuman’s proposition came just five years after World War Two....

GUY VERHOFSTADT has ripped into the Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban during a furious rant as he hailed the new EU budget.Guy Verhofstadt, MEP and former Belgian Prime Minister took a huge dig at the Hungarian Prime Minister during a speech over the new EU budget. It comes amid suggestions the European Union will impose new rules to allow funds to be cut off to countries where judicial rule is threatened. Mr Verhofstadt said the new budget was “not a revolution” but was a “break from the past” before he took a dig at Hungary. He said: “We have to...

The European Union has unveiled its first long-term budget for the post-Brexit era......coming in at 1.279 trillion euros for the 2021 to 2027 period. ​The departure of Britain, a net contributor, means other member states will have to pay more. ​To plug the gaps there'll be cuts to agricultural subsidies, but also increased contributions to areas considered to be priorities - such as migration and defence. ​EU Budget Commissioner Gunther Oettinger said: "We are going to tackle these problems by saving and by asking the member states to contribute a little bit more. Both saving and spending more, we believe...

Less than a third of British adults are opposed to U.S. President Donald J. Trump visiting the UK, and more back the trip than those who are against it. In an ICM poll conducted for The Guardian newspaper, people were asked simply if they supported or opposed the visit. One third, or 33 per cent, said they supported it and 31 per cent said they were opposed to it. Another 33 per cent said they neither supported nor opposed the visit. The poll also uncovered some interesting tribal differences, with Tories and Brexit supporters more likely to back the Trump...

THE TOURIST crackdown in Italy is spreading to Capri and Lake Garda after Venice introduced radical measures against holidaymakers. The Island of Capri wants to follow Venice in bringing in crowd control measures, which saw the installation of check points in some of the most congested parts. The mayor of the island just off Naples said with two million tourists a year the destination could “explode” from the weight of visitors. Hotels and B&Bs on the island had already reached 90 percent for the first long weekend of the high season leading the Capri Mayor Gianni De Martino to reconsider...

A European Commission poll has found that a strong majority of people in France, Germany, and Sweden believe the integration of migrants has failed in their country. People in all 28 member states were asked: “Generally speaking, how successful or not is the integration of most immigrants living in [your country].” Overall, across the open borders bloc, 55 per cent of people said integration it is going badly and 39 per cent said it had been a success, according to the survey commissioned by the European Union’s (EU) unelected executive branch. In Sweden, the picture was bleak, with just 24...

EU FURY: 'Appalling' Juncker snubs millions as he celebrates Karl Marx's 200th anniversary JEAN-CLAUDE JUNCKER is set to pay tribute to Karl Marx at a celebration of the father of Communism’s 200th anniversary in Germany, leading to accusations he has forgotten about the many millions of victims of his ideology. ... The European Commission President will travel to Trier, Germany, where he will give a speech to celebrate the 200th anniversary of Marx’s birth. Mr Juncker has invited to the celebration because he is an honourary citizen of the small German town, which is also the birthplace of the German...

President Trump meets with German Chancellor Angela Merkel at the White House next week. We can expect her to promote the pro-immigrant, pro-Iran agenda she’s been pushing on anyone who will listen. To understand the roots of her policies, it’s helpful to look at the last time she came calling to Washington, three months after President Trump took office. She was accompanied by the Kaesar – Joe Kaesar, CEO of Siemens, the German engineering and industrial giant. Peel back the chancellor’s humanitarian rhetoric of peace and tolerance and you will see her policies match the mercantile interests of Siemens seamlessly....

The European Union and Mexico reached an agreement on Saturday on a new free trade deal, a coup for both parties in the face of increased protectionism from the United States under President Donald Trump. Since its plans for a trade alliance with the United States were frozen after Trump’s election victory, the EU has focused instead on trying to champion open markets and seal accords with other like-minded countries. The agreement in principle with Mexico follows a deal struck last year with Japan and comes ahead of talks next week with the Mercosur bloc of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and...

EuropeÂ’s native population is not just aging, it is disappearing. The political and financial establishments rely on false official projections. Despite the UN Population Division prognoses that fertility rates will soon rebound to replacement rates, such a phenomenon is nowhere to be seen. In all European countries native populations have extremely low fertility and they are in full decline, and there are no signs that this will change anytime soon. Whatever official statisticians try to make you believe, an increase in fertility and the growth of populations in countries like France, the UK and Sweden is 100% migration related. These...

The European Commission this week revealed its 2018 enlargement report on enlargement that included Turkey, but only as a formality. Turkey is not even invited to a summit in Sofia on May 17 bringing together the leaders of the 28 EU member states and the other six candidate countries. In recent years, reports of Turkey’s progress towards EU membership have become regress reports. This time however, the Commission, sure that Turkey would never become an EU member, has really lashed out. The only progress highlighted in the report is in Turkey's migration and asylum policies. But the reason why is...

Former British Prime Minister David Cameron says he doesn't regret calling a referendum on the UK's membership of the European Union -- but wishes the result had gone the other way. "I made a promise to the British people -- I kept that promise," he told CNN's Christiane Amanpour in his first major broadcast interview since resigning in 2016, to mark the release of a report on development in fragile states by a committee he co-chairs. Cameron's fateful decision to call the referendum led to his political downfall and left his successor, Theresa May, with a diplomatic tangle that has...

Theresa May has suffered an embarrassing defeat in the House of Lords over the issue of Britain’s membership of the customs union, increasing pressure on the government to reopen the issue. An amendment to the EU withdrawal bill tabled by crossbencher Lord Kerr, and backed by several senior Conservatives, as well as Labour and the Lib Dems, was passed by a 348 votes to 225 – a majority of 123. The government suffered a significant rebellion, with 24 Conservatives, including former ministers Lord Patten, Lord Heseltine and Lord Willetts, backing the amendment.