Hungary will focus on key issues for central Europe during its upcoming EU presidency, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto claimed at a press conference with Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavsky in Budapest on Friday, 26 April. According to Szijjarto, the key issues for the region are enlargement for countries in
US nuclear firm Westinghouse Electric Company has signed memorandums of understanding (MOUs) with 17 Bulgarian suppliers to support the construction of two AP1000 reactors at the nuclear power plant in Kozloduy, north Bulgaria, and received a permit to begin transitioning to using fuel it has produced. As well as Bulgaria,
By 2030 Artificial Intelligence could be contributing as much as 11.5%, or USD 700bn (EUR 6.55bn), to the GDP of Southern Europe, including the Adriatic region, Kalin Dimtchev, country manager for Microsoft Adriatic, said in a recent interview about the AI transformation. Both the public and private sectors
Lithuania had the lowest annual inflation rate of 0.4% in the EU in March 2024, EU official statistics office Eurostat reports. The EU’s highest inflation rates were also recorded in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) countries, with the steepest price increases in Romania (6.7%), Croatia (4.9%
Lithuania will hold a constitutional referendum on whether its citizens can hold dual and multiple citizenships on 12 May 2024, in tandem with the first round of its presidential elections. Dual citizenship is mostly banned and around one thousand Lithuanian citizens annually give up their citizenship each year to take
The ruling conservative Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) won the most seats but failed to secure a simple majority in the snap parliamentary election held on Wednesday, 17 April. The HDZ won 61 seats (down 7) in the 151-member assembly, to 42 (up 22) for the Social Democratic Party-led (SPD) centre-left
Shipping label management and payment system Ikas has announced that it will initiate operations in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), as well as Germany and Switzerland. Ikas CEO Mustafa Namoglu said US tech giants largely overlook CEE and his company will offer SMEs a reliable, user-friendly interface as well as
Chinese President Xi Jinping will visit Budapest, Hungary and Belgrade, Serbia, at the beginning of May. After a trip to France from May 5-7, Xi Jinping will then stop over in Belgrade, before concluding his Europe tour in Budapest, Radio Free Europe (RFE) wrote, citing two independent sources. Orban China’
The first German troops of a brigade to be fully deployed as the German Army 45th Brigade Lithuania within 4 years arrived in Lithuania on Monday, 8 April, when Lieutenant General and Bundeswehr chief Alfons Mais visited Vilnius. Around 5,000 military personnel and civilians will move to Lithuania, including
A 147.8km stretch of the A7 motorway between Bucharest and Moldova and north Romania will open this year, Romanian Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu pledged at the Social Democratic Party (PSD) election conference in Suceava, north-east Romania, on Friday, 12 April. Parliamentary elections are scheduled to be held in Romania
Peter Pellegrini of Slovakia’s nationalist-left ruling coalition beat pro-Western opposition candidate Ivan Korcok by 53.1% to 46.9% in the presidential election on Saturday, 6 April. Turnout was 61.14%, the highest for a presidential election in Slovakia since 1999. Pellegrini, 48, is House speaker and an ally
Nationalist opposition party Law and Justice (PiS), toppled last year after eight years in power by Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s Civic Coalition (KO) grouping, came first in the country’s local government elections, an exit poll showed Sunday, 7 April. The election is seen as a bellwether for
Romanian Minister of Environment, Waters and Forests Mircea Fechet warned of the need for action as rising temperatures continue to increase the desertification of the country, speaking at the Romanian Business and Investment Roundtable in Bucharest on 5 April “According to our current science, this can only be combated through
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg agreed to progress with planning a greater role in coordinating aid to Ukraine on the first of two days of meetings at the NATO Headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, on Thursday 4 April, the 75th anniversary of the signing of the defence alliance’s founding document.
Romania and Bulgaria partly entered the Schengen free movement zone at midnight Sunday, 31 March, meaning air travel and freight, and sea freight in and out of the Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) countries no longer requires document control. The two countries’ partial Schengen membership does not include land routes