Europe

Initiated by a small opposition party, the decision reflects a push for a more competitive media landscape, with calls for the station’s privatisation.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.zip/post/25275398

Fake site set up by the Bundestag tricked several politicians into giving away their passwords and login credentials.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/4186692

The Russian budget now consistently runs a deficit, squeezed by a slowing civilian sector of the economy and burdened by a defense sector that has ballooned to account for more than 40% of all fiscal expenditures. Last year, the Ministry of Finance, in its draft budget for 2025-26, planned for a wind-down of military spending to previous levels. However, with the war dragging on and the postwar needs to replenish depleted arms stockpiles growing, it now envisages elevated spending on defense and national security until the end of the budget planning window in 2027.

The deficit is thus here to stay, and there is little doubt that its actual size will be bigger than planned: if we have to buy shells and even soldiers from North Korea, while the federal budget pays Russian citizens RUB 400,000 just for signing up for the army (with some regions already offering an additional RUB 3 million), then the 0.5% deficit planned for 2025 will hardly be the end of it.

This means additional revenues are needed. But where to source them?

The obvious answer is big business. And that’s what happened at the beginning of the war. For example, since its introduction in 2023, the windfall tax has brought in RUB 318.8 billion [...] Because of the windfall tax, combined with the loss of the European gas market and a normalization in gas prices, Gazprom reported a colossal loss of RUB 629 billion for 2023, becoming the most unprofitable company in Russia.

[...]

From January 1, 2025, a new, progressive personal income tax will come into effect: the state’s take on annual income of RUB 2.4 million or higher will increase from 13% to 15%.

[...]

Importantly, the tax burden on individuals was never as low as it is commonly believed: in reality, the average Russian paid about 53% of his earnings to the state. But the trick was that he saw the flat 13% personal income tax, while propaganda convinced him that this was it.

Contributions to various funds – pension, social and medical insurance – are taken out of employees’ salaries by employers. Not to mention the 10-19% VAT that everyone pays when they make any purchase. But Russians for the most part do not think about or simply do not know about these charges, often believing that since employers make social payments, the money comes out of someone else’s pocket.

It is precisely this lack of understanding that the Russian authorities are seemingly trying to take advantage of. When you look closely, you see that all the new levies are hidden so that the money can be extracted as inconspicuously as possible.

[...]

• The proposed automated tax payments for small business [which would mean small-business owners could not challenge automated payments] will go completely unnoticed, though this measure alone, with skillful manipulation of how the tax bill is calculated, could provide a tangible boost to the budget. After all, if the overcharge is slight, taxpayers, as a rule, will not dispute it – it is more expensive to take it to court.

• Meanwhile, the introduction of a **tax on childlessness **is being hotly debated – advocates want to make it rather painful. If it is really set, as proposed, at RUB 30,000-40,000 per month (which is still unlikely), it will be trumpeted as promoting fairness: after all, someone’s children will have to pay for the pensions of the childless.

• With excise duties on petroleum products, alcohol and sugary drinks, it is even easier: people typically do not attribute higher prices for gasoline and food to excise duty hikes, instead blaming “greedy traders.”

[Edit title for clarity.]

Poland has ordered the closure of the Russian consulate in the western city of Poznan over Moscow’s alleged “sabotage” attempts inside the country, Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski said Tuesday.

“I have information that Russia is behind sabotage attempts in Poland and allied countries. I have therefore decided to withdraw my permission for the Russian consulate to operate in Poznan,” Sikorski told reporters.

Russian staff at the consular mission will be recognized as “undesirable,” Poland’s state news agency PAP quoted him as saying.

Bloc seeks to bolster aid to Ukraine, sanctions against Russia and trade policy in case Republican is re-elected

Some three and a half million Georgians will be eligible to cast their ballots in the country’s first fully proportional vote that follows months of anti-democratic drifts by the ruling Georgian Dream party, including passing Foreign Agents Law and anti-LGBT legislation. The moves led to the suspension of the country’s EU integration process months after it became a candidate country, leaving pro-European and pro-democracy Georgians fearful of their country’s irreversible descent into authoritarianism.

Pro-Western opposition parties and coalitions will attempt to challenge Georgian Dream’s 12-year rule. But with the ruling party’s vast administrative, financial, and media resources, and the government’s escalating anti-LGBT propaganda, anti-Western conspiracies, and fear-mongering about Georgia repeating Ukraine’s fate of the Russian aggression, there is a widespread understanding that the race will be close, and the stakes will be high.

[...]

“It is very noticeable that a large part of the citizens not only want to participate in the elections but also want to observe,” Nino Dolidze, head of the International Society for Fair Elections and Democracy (ISFED), Georgia’s key election watchdog group, tells Civil.ge.

The deployment of observers has increased especially in the overseas districts, Dolidze notes. There were special efforts this year to increase the participation of expatriate voters, which has traditionally been insignificant despite the fact that hundreds of thousands of Georgian citizens live outside the country. 95,910 Georgians registered to vote abroad, about 45 percent more than in 2020, and while authorities did not open polling stations in various cities despite demand, there are active civic initiatives to help Georgian emigres with transportation on election day.

The Integrity Authority found that over the course of five years, two consortiums led by Káta-Mill Plusz Kft and Halker Kft, respectively, “stole HUF 10.2 billion ($27.8 million) from the poor,” according to an investigation the watchdog conducted.

The latter was found to have overcharged by around 70 percent, netting $20 million in the process, it said.

The report cited sugar as one of the products for which programs run by the Social and Child Protection Directorate was overcharged. In 2022, the Directorate was purchasing sugar for $2.83 per kilogram, almost four times the market value at the time.

Commenting on the outcome of the investigation, IA President Ferenc Biró stated that “the case is a fine example [of] how the abuse of power and corruption harm the most vulnerable social strata.”

[...]

The programs were part of the Operative Program for the Support of Needy Persons and were 85 percent funded by the European Union.

The IA was established in 2022 following pressure from the EU on Hungary, which included withholding billions of Euros worth of funds, to improve transparency measures. This followed years of mismanagement and graft by the Hungarian government under Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.

A 2022 report by the Corruption Research Centre Budapest showed that only 42 politically connected firms had won 21 percent of the value of EU-funded contracts since Orbán came to power in 2010.

WASHINGTON, Oct 24 (Reuters) - Spain on Thursday announced plans for a contribution of 400 million euros ($433 million) to the World Bank's fund for low-income countries, a 37% increase over the previous International Development Association replenishment cycle.

Fund pins blame on weak productivity and ageing workforce as it highlights continent’s weak post-pandemic performance

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/4068466

The European Commission -for the first time- officially backs Taiwan in its interpretation of UN Resolution 2758. While the EU still supports the “One China” principle, the bloc opposes "any unilateral actions that change the status quo by force or coercion", said Nicolas Schmit, European Commissioner for Jobs and Social Rights.

Resolution 2758 was adopted by the U.N. General Assembly in 1971, It recognized the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as the “only lawful representative of China.” It also expelled the then- representatives of Chiang Kai-shek, the former authoritarian regime, whose central government had retreated to Taiwan.

Beijing, however, increasingly claims that Resolution 2758 supports its stance that “Taiwan is part of the PR,” legitimizing its claim over Taiwan, even though the resolution provides no such legal basis, experts and lawmakers have said.

As a result of Beijing’s interpretation of Resolution 2758, however, Taiwan has not seat at the U.N. nor in other international organizations. Lawmakers around the globe have long been criticizing China’s stance and as well as its recent military manoeuvres in the Taiwan Strait and expressing their solidarity with Taiwan as a regular victim of disinformation campaigns and interference by Beijing.

It is for the first time that a member of the Commission officially expressed this opinion, and explicitly mentioning U.N. Resolution 2758. In his speech, Schmit reiterated the regional bloc's long-held "One China" principle, but also emphasized that the EU and Taiwan are "like-minded" and the European Commission opposes "any unilateral actions that change the status quo by force or coercion."

Referring to China’s recent military activities, Schmit said that “tensions in the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait have a direct impact on European security and prosperity,” adding that, therefore, the EU has a direct interest in the preservation of the status-quo in the Strait.

“We should take all opportunities to promote a more positive dynamic in cross-Strait relations, which contributes to peace, not only in the region, but also globally,” Schmit said.

Recent developments of U.N. Resolution 2758

Schmit’s speech is the first time that an EU Commissioner officially rejected China’s interpretation of U.N. Resolution 2758, joining Taiwan and the U.S.

In a resolution adopted in December 2023, European lawmakers also confirmed that the EU’s ‘One China policy’ has not changed, but that any attempt to unilaterally change the status quo in the Taiwan Strait, is not acceptable.

Back in September this year, the Dutch Parliament also rejected China's interpretation of the resolution in its claims over Taiwan and called for an EU-wide effort to support Taiwan's representation.

In August 2024, the Australian parliament also condemned China's use of UN Resolution 2758 by stating that the resolution"does not establish the People’s Republic of China's sovereignty over Taiwan and does not determine the future status of Taiwan in the UN".

Interesting, but somewhat biased video, about the economic issues facing Europe.

Ukraine into NATO is the only way to prevent Russian aggression, as Ukraine's Western allies are hesitant about allowing the war-torn country in the alliance.

"NATO should extend an invitation for membership to Ukraine as part of guaranteeing its future security," the Lithuanian Defence Minister Laurynas Kasčiūnas said.

Kasčiūnas also said "Russia needs to know that it can’t have a ‘veto’ over another country, or over the future size of NATO".

"Lithuania always supported Ukraine's invitation into the NATO, because in our understanding, you cannot send the message to Russia that they have at least informal veto power on NATO's enlargement," said the minister.

‘It's the biggest mistake,” he added.

[...]

"How we respond to Russia's illegal war of aggression against Ukraine tells the world who we are and the values we stand for," Kaja Kallas has said in a letter to the European Parliament ahead of her confirmation hearing.

Kaja Kallas, the former primer minister of Estonia, has made her pitch to become the next foreign policy chief of the European Union by issuing stark warnings against Russia's "imperialistic dream" and China's "unfair competition".

[...]

"My priority in engaging with China will be to safeguard the EU’s geopolitical and economic security," Kallas tells MEPs.

"The most pressing challenges here are China's support for Russia as well as structural imbalances between the EU and China that result from non-market policies and practices, which create unfair competition and an unlevel playing field."

China has been accused of excessively subsidising its domestic industries, flooding the global markets with cheap products, passing discriminatory laws against foreign firms and stealing sensitive know-how.

[...]

Kallas believes an "assertive" joint response is indispensable to navigate the 21st century and ensure the EU is protected against "malign external influence."

[...]

cross-posted from: https://sopuli.xyz/post/18367590