Latest news with #EEAS
See - Sada Elbalad
4 days ago
- Business
- See - Sada Elbalad
OIC, EU Hold Consultative Meeting on Mediation
Mohamed Mandour The General Secretariat of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) convened with the European External Action Service (EEAS) for their inaugural high-level consultative and training meeting focused on mediation strategies. Held at the EEAS headquarters in Brussels, this meeting aimed to explore the nuanced mediation efforts undertaken by both organizations. The agenda included not only the exchange of best practices but also targeted brainstorming sessions that engaged participants in analyzing specific conflict scenarios. Through these discussions, attendees identified pathways to fortify collaborative efforts and leverage mediation as a critical tool for advancing global peace and stability. read more Gold prices rise, 21 Karat at EGP 3685 NATO's Role in Israeli-Palestinian Conflict US Expresses 'Strong Opposition' to New Turkish Military Operation in Syria Shoukry Meets Director-General of FAO Lavrov: confrontation bet. nuclear powers must be avoided News Iran Summons French Ambassador over Foreign Minister Remarks News Aboul Gheit Condemns Israeli Escalation in West Bank News Greek PM: Athens Plays Key Role in Improving Energy Security in Region News One Person Injured in Explosion at Ukrainian Embassy in Madrid News Ayat Khaddoura's Final Video Captures Bombardment of Beit Lahia News Australia Fines Telegram $600,000 Over Terrorism, Child Abuse Content Arts & Culture Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban's $4.7M LA Home Burglarized Sports Former Al Zamalek Player Ibrahim Shika Passes away after Long Battle with Cancer Sports Neymar Announced for Brazil's Preliminary List for 2026 FIFA World Cup Qualifiers News Prime Minister Moustafa Madbouly Inaugurates Two Indian Companies Arts & Culture New Archaeological Discovery from 26th Dynasty Uncovered in Karnak Temple Business Fear & Greed Index Plummets to Lowest Level Ever Recorded amid Global Trade War Arts & Culture Zahi Hawass: Claims of Columns Beneath the Pyramid of Khafre Are Lies News Flights suspended at Port Sudan Airport after Drone Attacks
Arab News
25-05-2025
- Politics
- Arab News
Saudi deputy FM receives EU official in Riyadh
RIYADH: Saudi Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Waleed Elkhereiji received Olof Skoog, deputy secretary-general for political affairs at the European External Action Service, and his accompanying delegation, in Riyadh on Sunday. During the meeting, they discussed bilateral relations between the Kingdom and the EU and other topics of common interest, the Foreign Ministry wrote in a post on X. A meeting was also held as part of the third round of political consultations between the Kingdom and the EEAS. Senior officials from both sides participated in the session, chaired by Raed bin Khalid Qarmli, director-general of the general directorate of policy planning at the Saudi Foreign Ministry, with Skoog representing the European side.
Yahoo
01-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Details emerge of EU defence summit in Poland
Defence ministers will discuss an initiative by Kaja Kallas, the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, to boost military assistance to Ukraine at an informal EU summit in Warsaw on 2-3 April. Source: European Pravda, citing an official from the European External Action Service (EEAS) Details: The source stated that Kallas' proposal to boost military aid to Ukraine is primarily focused on addressing the Ukrainian Armed Forces' critical need for ammunition: two million rounds of large-calibre ammunition worth €5 billion by the end of 2025. "The agenda for the meeting consists of two sessions. The first is about the EU's military support for Ukraine. The second one is about the White Paper on European Defence [by European Commissioner Andrius Kubilius]," the EEAS official said, adding that "enhanced EU military support and possible security guarantees for Ukraine" will be discussed during the first session. "This includes the high representative's initiative to strengthen military support for Ukraine, opportunities for deepening cooperation between the EU and the Ukrainian defence industry, and cooperation with NATO and other partners. Time will allow us to discuss these topics in depth," the source added. "We've invited Ukrainian Defence Minister Rustem Umierov to the first session, as well as the NATO secretary general, who, due to his attendance at the ministerial summit in Brussels, will be replaced by Deputy Secretary General Radmila Shekerinska," the EEAS official said. According to the official, the second session, which will focus on the White Paper and the ReArm Europe plan, is intended to be a "quick exchange of views between ministers on proposals for their funding" so that a concrete action plan can be drawn up for the European Council summit on 26-27 June. "It's essential to help Ukraine achieve a comprehensive, just and lasting peace, and this can only be achieved from a position of strength. That's why the EU high representative put forward the initiative to provide enhanced military support to Ukraine, particularly in terms of ammunition," the source added. "Ukraine needs 2 million rounds of large-calibre ammunition worth approximately €5 billion from us in 2025. This request was made directly by Zelenskyy during the last European Council summit," the source said. The official emphasised that ministers do not make decisions during informal summits. However, they intend to lay the groundwork for a decision to be made at the next EU Foreign Affairs Council meeting on security issues, scheduled for 14 April. "We want to get more information about what member states are planning to send to Ukraine in terms of ammunition supplies. And to see what we can do more collectively as the EU. Member states have already provided us with quite a lot of information, but we would like to have a complete picture," the source concluded. Background: Kallas believes that if EU countries find it difficult to approve a €40 billion annual aid package for Kyiv, they should take small steps and initially agree on €5 billion for ammunition for Ukraine. Support Ukrainska Pravda on Patreon!
Euronews
17-03-2025
- Politics
- Euronews
Brussels 'intensively' looking to start talks on EU-UK security pact
The European Commission is 'intensively' trying to get member states to give it a mandate to negotiate a security and defence partnership with the United Kingdom, a top EU official said on Monday. Negotiating such a partnership requires the unanimous approval of all 27 member states, but some countries, like France, have already signalled they want any security pact to be included in a wider reset in relations, seemingly returning to the Brexit mantra that 'nothing is agreed until everything is agreed'. For the EU's external action service (EEAS), increased cooperation on security and defence with the UK 'is a must' because the current geopolitical context is 'dramatically' different from when the two sides struck the Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA) that lays out the terms of their relationship, its Managing Director for Europe, Matti Maasikas, told lawmakers on Monday. 'What could we do more? This being the EU you need the legal framework, you need legal basis to do things and since the foreign policy declaration was left out of the Trade and Cooperation Agreement, we need to find new ways and a new basis for our cooperation,' Maasikas told lawmakers from Brussels and London gathered at the European Parliament for an EU-UK Parliamentary Partnership Assembly. 'The Security and defence partnership could be one of those instruments, should be if you ask me, if you ask the High Representative.' 'For that, the High Representative needs the mandate from the EU Council, meaning the consent of all member states, the discussions are intensively ongoing to obtain this mandate,' he added. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who came to power last summer, has been pushing for a security and defence pact which he said last month should focus on research and development, military mobility across Europe, greater cooperation on missions and operations, and industrial collaboration. Nick Thomas-Symonds, Britain's minister for EU relations, told the same joint parliamentary assembly on Monday that the UK is 'ready to negotiate' while Catriona Mace, the foreign and development policy director at the UK Mission to the EU, said that 'the status quo should not be the extent of our ambition'. 'We already work closely on our collective security,' she said. 'We must do more together.' Donald Trump's abrupt decision to launch talks with Russia on the end of its war in Ukraine has accelerated the rapprochement between the UK and EU member states with a flurry of leaders' meetings in various formats held over the past five weeks to discuss European defence and security guarantees for Ukraine. On this topic, France and the UK are more in lockstep, having both indicated their readiness to send troops to Ukraine as part of a peacekeeping mission following a negotiated truce between Moscow and Kyiv. High representative Kaja Kallas, who has tabled an initiative for a coalition of the willing to provide military support worth up to €40 billion in the short term to Ukraine, is scheduled to visit the UK on Wednesday where she will meet Chief of the Defence Staff Tony Radakin. 'I have high hopes on very fruitful discussions on all the issues,' Maasikas told lawmakers, 'on the pragmatic cooperation that goes on, and also on widening the basis for this cooperation.' Each ChatGPT question is estimated to use around 10 times more electricity than a traditional Google search. According to the nonprofit research firm Electric Power Research Institute, a ChatGPT request uses 2.9 watt-hours while traditional Google queries use about 0.3 watt-hours each. With an estimated 9 billion daily searches, this would mean an additional demand of nearly 10 TWh of electricity per year. The AI industry relies on data centres to train and operate its models, leading to increased energy demand and contributing to global greenhouse gas emissions. Microsoft announced its CO2 emissions had risen nearly 30% since 2020 due to data centre expansion. Google's global greenhouse gas emissions in 2023 were almost 50% higher than in 2019, largely due to the energy demand tied to data centres. Energy use by artificial intelligence currently only represents a fraction of the technology sector's power consumption and is estimated to be around 2 to 3% of total global emissions. However, this percentage is likely to go up as more companies, governments and organisations use AI to drive efficiency and productivity. There are currently more than 8,000 data centres globally, with about 16% of these located in Europe. The majority of these centres are concentrated in the financial centres of Frankfurt, London, Amsterdam, Paris, and Dublin. It is estimated that the electricity consumption in the data centre sector in the European Union will reach almost 150 TWh by 2026, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). Electricity demand from data centres in Ireland was 5.3 TWh in 2022, representing 17% of the country's total electricity consumed. That is equivalent to the amount of electricity consumed by all urban residential buildings. If AI application use continues to expand at a rapid rate, the sector could account for 32% of the country's total electricity demand by 2026. Denmark also hosts 34 data centres, half of them located in Copenhagen. As in Ireland, Denmark's total electricity demand is forecast to grow mainly due to the data centre sector's expansion, which is expected to consume 6 TWh by 2026, reaching just under 20% of the country's electricity demand. Meanwhile, data centres in Nordic countries – such as Sweden, Norway, and Finland – benefit from lower electricity costs. This is attributed to lower cooling demand due to their colder weather. The largest actor amongst Nordic countries is Sweden, with 60 data centres, and half of them in Stockholm. Given decarbonisation targets, Sweden and Norway may further increase their participation in the data centre market since almost all of their electricity is generated from low-carbon sources.
Yahoo
15-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
EU diplomats suggest doubling military aid for Ukraine this year
By Lili Bayer and Andrew Gray BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Union should be prepared to go as far as doubling its military aid to Ukraine this year to 40 billion euros ($43 billion) if necessary, according to a discussion paper by the bloc's diplomatic service seen by Reuters on Friday. The paper, an updated version of an earlier proposal which set out Ukraine's requirements but did not name a target figure, also says each EU country participating in the effort should contribute "in line with its economic weight". With the future of U.S. backing for Ukraine uncertain, EU countries have expressed a broad willingness to continue supporting the country in the war triggered by Russia's 2022 invasion, but diplomats say several states oppose fixed targets. The paper says the EU gave about 20 billion euros in military aid to Ukraine last year and encourages EU countries to do at least the same again in 2025, with the total "potentially reaching" 40 billion euros, depending on Kyiv's needs. EU leaders are likely to discuss the proposal by the European External Action Service (EEAS), headed by former Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, at a summit next week. The EEAS "non-paper" - diplomatic jargon for a discussion document rather than a formal proposal - suggests leaders agree as a first step next week to provide 2 million rounds of large-calibre artillery ammunition to Kyiv this year. It suggests that some of the costs of the plan could come from a scheme that takes windfall profits from Russian assets inside the EU and uses them for the benefit of Ukraine. The contents of the new proposal were previously reported by Politico late on Thursday evening. Hungary, whose prime minister Viktor Orban has criticised EU sanctions on Russia and military assistance to Ukraine, said on Friday his country should contribute funds to a common EU defence policy, but not agree to joint EU borrowing for defence. ($1 = 0.9227 euros)
