euronews: Montenegro election: Who are the triumphant opposition factions and what do they stand for?

 Consisting of three blocs or alliances, For the Future of Montenegro, Peace is Our Nation and Black on White, the opposition won a wafer-thin majority with 50.7 per cent of the votes, or 41 out of 81 seats in the Montenegrin parliament. [...]

Despite the unifying goal of unseating the current DPS government and assurances that they are collectively committed to staying the course on issues such as EU integration, the rule of law and the overturning the DPS government's law on religious freedom, the opposition’s disparate values and agendas may mean that forming a viable alternative government is not an easy task.

One of the biggest challenges will be the reconciling of opposing pro-EU and pro-Serbia and Russia stances across the competing opposition alliances. The general opinion among voters tends to reflect an anxiety that ideological antagonisms will most likely be the source of any future instability within the new government.

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Five takeaways from the Polish presidential election

Experts said prior to the election it was a vote between two different visions of Poland. "This is, of course, a win, but in a psychological and social sense it is not a triumph," said Ewa Marciniak, a political scientist at the University of Warsaw. The election also saw a generational divide, she added, with young voters supporting Trzaskowski and older voters supporting Duda. [...]

LGBT rights were a key divisive point between the two presidential candidates, with Duda promising to protect families from the "LGBT ideology", stating it was more dangerous than communism. [...]

"It's an irony that, in an election where many see a negative development for democracy moving forward, such a sign of democratic health like high participation took place. But high participation is not a neutral development, it also carries political implications," said Angelos Chryssogelos, a lecturer in Politics and International Relations at London Metropolitan University

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euronews: Europeans 'radically' reassessing view on world order due to COVID-19, research finds

Drawing on data from nine EU member states — which together comprise two-thirds of the bloc's population — research from the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) found that 63 per cent of Europeans are in favour of more EU cooperation to tackle the pandemic and other issues of global significance.

The authors found that although some commentators predicted that the pandemic would lead to a surge in Euroscepticism and nationalism as borders were shut, the opposite is true. Large majorities of people in all surveyed countries said that they are now more firmly convinced of the need for further EU cooperation than they were before the crisis. [...]

Across all nine countries surveyed — Bulgaria, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and Sweden — only 29 per cent of respondents have greater confidence in their government. In contrast, 33 per cent have lost confidence in the power of government. [...]

But the "Strategic Sovereigntists" made up the biggest group with 42 per cent of respondents. They believe that the EU's relevance will be dependent on its capacity to act as a cohesive bloc.

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euronews: 'Faithless elector': Supreme Court will hear case that could change how presidents are chosen

The answer to the question could be a decisive one: are the electors who cast the actual Electoral College ballots for president and vice-president required to follow the results of the popular vote in their states? Or are they free to vote as they wish? [...]

More than half the states have laws requiring electors to obey the results of the popular vote in their states and cast their ballots accordingly. The problem of what are known as "faithless electors" has not been much of an issue in American political history, because when an elector refuses to follow the results of a state's popular vote, the state usually simply throws the ballot away. [...]

States are free to choose their electors however they want, the court said, and can even require electors to pledge their loyalty to their political parties. But once the electors are chosen and report in December to cast their votes as members of the electoral college, they are fulfilling a federal function, and a state's authority has ended.

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euronews: Is flight-shaming helping resurrect Europe's overnight trains?

It is a risk that is paying off, Rieder claims. He said passenger numbers were up 10% last year and has put the increase down to climate-conscious travellers. [...]

In Sweden, home of teenage activist Greta Thunberg and the flight-shaming movement, airport passenger numbers were down last year for the first time in a decade. There is a similar trend in Germany.

There is no evidence that this decrease is solely down to people feeling guilty about flying, but experts say it’s played a part. [...]

Earlier this month Swedavia, which operates 10 of the country's busiest airports, revealed a 4% fall in passengers last year, compared with 2018. International travellers fell by 2% but those taking domestic flights by 9%.

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euronews: European Investment Bank will stop funding fossil fuel projects by end of 2021

The European Investment Bank will stop funding fossil fuel projects at the end of 2021, it announced on Thursday, in a landmark decision for the fight against climate change. [...]

Under the new policy, energy projects applying for EIB funding will need to show they can produce one kilowatt-hour of energy while emitting less than 250 grams of carbon dioxide, a move which bans traditional gas-burning power plants.

Gas projects are still possible but would have to be based on what the bank called “new technologies,” such as carbon capture and storage, combining heat and power generation or mixing in renewable gases with the fossil natural gas.[...]

Still, 93% of Europeans think climate change is a serious problem, according to recent Eurobarometer research. The survey also suggests climate change has overtaken international terrorism as the second most serious concern in Europe after poverty, hunger, and lack of drinking water.

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euronews: Police arrest at least 25 after clashes at gay movie premiere in Georgia

A few hundred demonstrators blocked the road outside a cinema in the city centre of the country's capital, Tbilisi, on Friday ahead of the first screening of "And Then We Danced". The film tells the story of two young male Georgian ballet dancers falling in love.

The protesters chanted slogans such as "Long live Georgia" and "Shame" and tried to force their way inside the cinema but where held back by riot police. Some were holding crosses and religious icons.[...]

Tickets for the scheduled three days of screenings at a handful of cinemas in Tbilisi and the port city of Batumi sold out quickly, but the country's influential Orthodox Church denounced the film as an attempt to undermine Christian values and legalise "sin".

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euronews: Watch: Scientists have taught rats to drive - and they love it

A team of researchers at the University of Richmond have taught rats to drive mini-cars - and not only are the rodents good at it, they enjoy it too. [...]

The study found that the rats actually felt more relaxed after driving, with heightened levels of dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA), the hormone that counteracts stress. [...]

That result was reinforced when the rats were given ‘passengers’, with researchers noting that only the animals actually driving the car saw a decrease in stress.

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euronews: Swiss election: Greens gain while far-right loses ground

As climate change and the country's relationship with the European Union were the main focuses of the political campaign, the Greens rode on voters' climate concerns in the parliamentary election. [...]

According to final results, the Greens (left) are now the fourth party in the National Council (lower house) ahead of the Christian Democratic Party, and trailing the right-wing Liberal-Radical Party by just one seat. [...]

Cabinet seats have been divvied up among the SVP, SP, FDP and CVP in nearly the same way since 1959. The three biggest parties get two seats and the fourth-biggest gets one under the informal "magic formula" system. [...]

Analysts caution against expecting too radical a shift after a campaign that was light on typical hot-button issues such as migration and Swiss ties with the European Union that have given the anti-EU SVP a boost in the past.

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euronews: Hungary local elections: Opposition candidate Karácsony unseats Fidesz-backed incumbent in Budapest

Hungary's opposition scored its biggest election victory in a decade on Sunday when opposition challenger Gergely Karacsony defeated ruling party-backed incumbent Istvan Tarlos in the Budapest mayoral election. [...]

Opposition parties were also projected to win a majority in the Budapest General Assembly with 17 members, compared with 14 delegates from Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s ruling Fidesz-Christian Democrat alliance and two independents. [...]

Budapest is home to about a fifth of Hungary’s population of 10 million, but it is responsible for more than a third of its economic output and plays an outsized role in all walks of national life.

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euronews: Denmark calls for EU ban on all diesel and petrol cars by 2040

Denmark made headlines in October 2018 when its government announced that it would ban the sale of all fossil fuel-powered cars by 2030 but it subsequently scrapped the idea because this would have breached EU rules. [...]

Lithuania, Latvia, Slovenia, Bulgaria and several other countries, however, suggested that more must be done to stop the "carbon leakage" of selling second-hand autos from western Europe to the eastern region.

Jorgensen said it was important to communicate the bloc's long-term policy directions to carmakers and that Denmark's next step was to set up an alliance with the 10 member states that support its proposal.

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euronews: Pope Francis adds 13 like-minded cardinals to Catholic hierarchy

Among the 13 are 10 cardinals who are under age 80 and therefore eligible to vote in a conclave, increasing the likelihood that a future pope might end up looking an awful lot like the current one. These are churchmen who care for migrants, promote dialogue with Muslims and minister to the faithful in poor, far-flung missionary posts.

With Saturday's consistory, Francis will have named 52% of the voting-age cardinals. Many hail from churches in the developing world, a sign of Francis' desire to mirror the universal face of the Catholic Church in its leadership ranks. [...]

The consistory comes at a fraught time in Francis' six-year papacy. Opposition is mounting among conservative Catholics who disapprove of his emphasis on the environment, migrants and other issues rather than the doctrinaire focus of his predecessor Pope Benedict XVI.

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euronews: This report tallied the human and economic toll of gun violence in all 50 states. The cost is staggering.

U.S. teens and young adults, ages 15-24, are 50 times more likely to die by gun violence than they are in other economically advanced countries, according to the 50-state breakdown.

In 2017 — the year of a mass shooting in Las Vegas that killed 58 and injured hundreds — nearly 40,000 people died from gun-related injuries, including 2,500 school children, the report said, noting that six in 10 gun deaths in the U.S. are suicides. [...]

Rural states, meanwhile, have the highest rates of gun deaths and bear the largest costs as a share of their economies. Nationally, the cost of gun violence in the U.S. runs $229 billion a year, or 1.4 percent of the gross domestic product, the report said. [...]

The report noted, however, that the economic toll of gun violence is difficult to measure because of a decades-old federal prohibition on funding for research into the problem. Since 1996, Congress has added a little-known amendment to spending legislation that prohibits the use federal funds to advocate or promote gun control. While lawmakers clarified the provision in aspending package last year, stating that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention can conduct research on the causes of gun violence, no money was allocated for such research. [...]

It also found economically deprived areas outside of rural America are also hit hard. About 7,500 African Americans die from gun violence every year, the report said — making it 20 times more likely that a young black male will die by a firearm homicide than a white peer.

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euronews: Trust in EU at its highest in five years, new poll shows

At 44%, trust in the EU is at its highest level since 2014 and ten percentage points ahead of trust in national governments and parliament, Eurobarometer said.

Among other key findings, 61% of Europeans are optimistic about the future of the EU.

Meanwhile, 55% of Europeans say they are satisfied with the way democracy works in the EU, the highest score since 2004.

Support for the euro reached a record high 76%.

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euronews: EU debunks Boris Johnson's fishy claims about food regulation

"After decades of sending kippers like this through the post, he's had his costs massively increased by Brussels bureaucrats who have insisted that each kipper must be accompanied by this, a plastic ice pillow. Pointless, pointless, expensive, environmentally damaging. Health and safety, ladies and gentlemen," Johnson said. [...]

But EU officials debunked Johnson's claim on Thursday, with a spokeswoman telling reporters that although the bloc has "strict rules when it comes to fresh fish" they do not "apply to processed fishery products". [...]

"Foods that need refrigerating must be kept cool while they are being transported. This may need to be packed in an insulated box with coolant gel or in a cool bag," the guidelines continue. [...]

He also pointed out that the Isle of Man — a self-governing British dependency located in the Irish Sea — is not in the bloc.

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euronews: Government restrictions on religion rising in Europe — Pew Research Centre study

It highlighted that although religious restrictions remain higher in the Middle East-North Africa region, the biggest increases over the last decade have been in Europe and in sub-Saharan Africa.

It flagged, for instance, the growing number of European governments placing limits on Muslim women's dress. In 2007, there were five countries reported to have such restrictions in Europe, by 2017, that number had quadrupled to 20. [...]

Pew also flagged Spain as having experienced the largest increases in its score for government limits on religious activity. Catalonia introduced bans on the burqa and niqab, while religious groups such as Latter-day Saints and Jehovah's Witnesses have faced restrictions on public preaching and proselytising.

Social hostilities related to religious norms also rose dramatically in Europe. Four countries in 2007 reported having individuals or groups who used violence or the threat of violence to try and force others to accept their own religious practices and beliefs.

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euronews: Pope bombarded with insults after tweeting to pray for migrants

Users were quick to react to the tweet with some asking the pope to think instead of earthquake victims or of Vincent Lambert, the quadriplegic Frenchman whose parents recently accepted to end life support.

Some said the Pope should spend more time talking about Jesus and other religious topics.[...]

The same day, the front page of Italy's daily la Repubblica newspaper ran the headline: "Catholics at a crossroads: the Pope or Salvini."

The newspaper interviewed the Jesuit Father Sorge who compared Italy's new security decree, which includes provisions that clamp down on migrant entry to Italy, with racial laws of the Fascist regime in the country in 1938.

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euronews: LGBT rights in Europe: Some countries 'moving backwards on equality for first time in a decade'

An example provided was in Bulgaria, where the means for trans-people to change their names or gender markers in official documents has been removed.

In Serbia and Kosovo, the governments have failed to renew action plans on gender equality, the report said.

Hungary and Turkey had also regressed, with the latter doing so since 2015, due to each governments' "failure to uphold fundamental civil and political rights". [...]

Azerbaijan ranked the worst country in Europe for LGBT equality policies and laws, with Turkey and Armenia scoring second and third last respectively.

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euronews: Bad diets deadlier than smoking tobacco, warns new study

An analysis of almost 20 years of diet data from 195 countries found that poor diets killed 11 million people globally in 2017.

The biggest killer of them all is salt, which was found to have shortened the lives of 3 million people, according to the global burden of disease study published by the Lancet on Thursday.

Cardiovascular disease was a major killer for approximately 10 million out of 11 million food-related deaths.

Consuming not enough fruit was found to have contributed to the death of 2 million people, while a diet of too little whole grains contributed to the death of 3 million lives. [...]

China in particular had the highest rates of diet-related cardiovascular disease deaths (299 deaths per 100,000 people) and the highest rates of diet-related cancer deaths (42 deaths per 100 000 population).

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euronews: Which country in Europe has the highest imprisonment rate?

It dropped 6.6%, from 109.7 inmates per 100,000 of people in 2016 to 102.5 last year, according to the Council of Europe. [...]

Russia has by far the highest proportion of people behind bars in Europe, with 418.3 inmates per 100,000 of the country's population.

Many ex-Eastern Bloc countries also have high incarceration rates: Russia is followed by Georgia (252.2), Azerbaijan (235) and Lithuania (234.9), the highest in the EU.

Europe’s lowest incarceration rates were found in Iceland (46.8), Finland (51.1), Netherlands (54.4), Sweden (56.5), Denmark (63.2) and Norway (65.4). [...]

Iceland had the biggest jump in the proportion of people behind bars between 2016 and 2018, recording a 25.4% increase. [...]

France had the highest suicide rate per 100,000 inmates at 12.6, just ahead of Austria at 12.3, and Germany at 11.8.

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