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Catch up with the most important stories from around Europe and beyond - latest news, breaking news, World, Business, Entertainment, Politics, Culture, Travel.
READ MORE : http://www.euronews.com/2025/05/15/latest-news-bulletin-may-15th-midday
Subscribe to our channel. Euronews is available on Dailymotion in 12 languages
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NewsTranscript
00:00Russian President Vladimir Putin's aide arrived in Istanbul instead of him to represent Moscow in peace talks with Kyiv.
00:12A draft law to punish organizations that accept foreign funding if they, for example, influence democratic debate or portray the rule of law in Hungary in a negative light was proposed by a lawmaker and Prime Minister Viktor Orbán's ruling Fidesz party.
00:30Under the draft, even a major president of the U.S.
00:59A micro-donation from a dual national or an EU grant can be considered foreign funding.
01:05And with the threat of debilitating fines and a ban on domestic donor funding, ultimately ordinary Hungarian citizens will suffer, according to a spokesperson for the NGO, Ah Hang.
01:16According to the draft, the Office for the Protection of Sovereignty, created last year, will decide on the offending organizations.
01:37According to the draft, the Office for the Protection of Sovereignty, created last year, will decide on the offending organizations.
01:46The body responsible for implementing the so-called transparency bill does not itself even operate from the address of its official registration.
01:54Természetesen kértünk reakciót a Fidesztől is, de nem kaptunk választ.
01:58Az érintett civil szervezetek szerint olyan tágak lesznek a jogszabályi keretek, hogy teljesen az alkalmazó hatóságon múlik, hogy melyik szervezetet akarja megbüntetni, és melyiket nem.
02:08A civil szervezetek átláthatóságáról egy olyan hivatal fog majd dönteni, amit a hátam mögött látható irodaházban székel, de még egy táblája sincs.
02:17Tanács Gábor, Euronews, Budapest.
02:47Köszönöm szépen a feliratot, Volodymyr Zelenskyy's proposal for a face-to-face meeting in the Turkish city,
02:52which the Ukrainian leader had hoped would lead to a full ceasefire.
02:57It comes after Putin had suggested himself over the past weekend that Russia and Ukraine would sit down for direct talks,
03:04to which Zelenskyy promptly responded.
03:07U.S. President Donald Trump had also said he was considering traveling to Istanbul for the talks.
03:13However, he also won't be present.
03:16Instead, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Senior Envoy Steve Witkoff and Keith Kellogg
03:22are representing the U.S.
03:28Civil society and non-governmental organizations have slammed Hungary's proposed Russian-style
03:33foreign agent law, labeling it an attempt to silence the independent press.
03:39German Chancellor Friedrich Merz delivered his first speech to the Bundestag, where he
03:44pledged big reforms.
03:46The newly appointed leader made big promises on various pressing issues, from the war in
03:50Ukraine to the stagnant German economy.
03:53One of the big reforms he's promised is to increase Berlin's role in the European Union.
03:58I have given European institutions a new responsibility of Germany.
04:05The times in which Germany, when the important questions of European politics,
04:10simply holds the voice, these times should be over.
04:16Merz said that he's held two phone calls with U.S. President Donald Trump recently regarding
04:21Ukraine.
04:22The German leader says he'll do all he can to bridge the gap between the U.S. and Europe
04:27to preserve the political unity of the West.
04:29It is of tremendous importance that the political West, my ladies and gentlemen, does not
04:37divide itself.
04:38And that's why I will continue to take all the challenges to continue to keep the greatest
04:43unity between the European and the American partners.
04:48Merz also promised to revive an unusually sluggish German economy plagued by years of stagnation.
04:56He has also expressed his desire to boost the country's defensive
05:26businesses and continue to fulfill NATO obligations.
05:29The German Chancellor also committed to reducing bureaucracy, offering tax incentives for businesses,
05:35and fostering more trade deals within the EU.
05:37French Prime Minister François Bayrou faced one of his most politically sensitive moments
05:46yet on Wednesday evening, testifying under oath before a parliamentary committee examining
05:54what he knew or didn't know about decades of abuse at a Catholic school in southwestern France.
06:01The committee is investigating Bayrou's potential knowledge of allegations at the Notre-Dame-de-Betarram
06:08school where 200 complaints of sexual and physical abuse have been filed since February last year.
06:17Bayrou swore that he knew nothing about the violence and even denounced the political instrumentalization
06:23of the affair.
06:25He also claimed to have learned of the allegations through the press and denied ever having any sort of insider information.
06:35Despite it being a very personal issue for the Prime Minister, this Catholic school is the same school
06:41where his wife once taught and that his children also attended years ago.
06:46The political bombshell dropped earlier this year after media reports suggested that Bayrou may have known
06:54about the abuse as early as the 1990s and tried to cover it up back when he was the French Minister of Education.
07:03Another major turning point of the scandal, last month his own daughter came out and said that she was beaten
07:11by a priest from that same school when she was 14 years old.
07:15She said that she never told her father about the abuse.
07:20And while Bayrou may have survived multiple no-confidence votes and a fractured parliament since his appointment
07:28last December, the Notre-Dame-de-Betarram affair may prove to be harder to outrun.
07:34KOSOVSKA Vlada
07:36Predsjednik Evropskog saveta Antoni Okošta stiguje u Prištinu u vreme institucionalne i parlamentarne krize
07:45kada i više od tri meseca od završetka izbora nema formirane skupštine,
07:51a nema ni na vidiku kada će se formirati nova kosovska vlada.
07:56Također, kosovske vlasti zadnjih dana zatvaraju i preostale institucije
08:02koje funkcionišu u sistemu Republike Srbije, a radile su na severu Kosova.
08:08Antoni Okošta se dana sastao sa predsjednicom Kosova Viosom Osmani
08:13i premijerom u tehničkom mandatu, ali i poslanikom Albinom Kurtijem,
08:18a posle sastanka sa Osmani, sa zajedničke konferencije za medije,
08:22je poručio da dialog između Kosova i Srbije je ključni
08:28za nastavak daljih euro integracija i Kosova i Srbije.
08:33Anđel Klačup, Euronews Srbija.
08:35A major fire followed an explosion at a chemical warehouse
08:42in Alcala de Guadaira, near Sevilla, Spain, on Wednesday afternoon.
08:47The Plansur company evacuated staff from its Lared industrial estate facility
08:51after alerts around 1.20 p.m.
08:54Authorities called the incident worrying due to the fire's scale
08:57and the unknown burning chemicals.
08:59One person suffered slight burns while toxic smoke
09:03forced 80,000 people in the area to stay indoors.
09:07Some homes near the A92 motorway were also evacuated.
09:12Civil protection issued mobile alerts in Alcala de Guadaira
09:15advising residents to close windows and doors and use masks.
09:20Andalusia's regional government activated its level 1 emergency plan
09:23with firefighters from 7 stations tackling the blaze.
09:26The Plansur's large chemical distribution facility
09:30has a massive smoke plume, reportedly visible over 80 kilometers away.
09:37Emergency crews are working to control the fire and prevent its spread.
09:50This is a legal and political thunderclap.
09:53The General Court of the European Union
09:55has condemned the European Commission's lack of transparency
09:58in the negotiations on vaccines during the COVID-19 pandemic.
10:03The judges annulled the Commission's refusal to disclose the text messages
10:06exchanged between its president and the head of Pfizer.
10:10These text messages between Ursula von der Leyen
10:12and the pharmaceutical giant took place during negotiations
10:15on the purchase of almost 2 billion doses.
10:18The Commission maintains that it does not hold these text messages
10:22and that their content was insubstantial.
10:25Another convincing line of defense.
10:26For the moment, it's still unclear why they thought
10:32that this message did not include important information.
10:36So this needs to be clarified.
10:39And also, in a way, we can see that, in general,
10:42there is still a lot of secrecy around this.
10:44We still don't know.
10:45It's still unclear if these messages were deleted.
10:48If, as the courts say, were deleted on purpose,
10:50automatically, what happened there?
10:52So, in our opinion, since the beginning,
10:54text messages should be included.
10:56The court criticized the Commission for failing to provide
10:59credible evidence to explain why it was unable to provide
11:02these text messages at the request of a journalist
11:05from the New York Times.
11:06In addition, the judges considered that the institution
11:09was unable to clearly specify whether or not
11:12these text messages had been deleted.
11:14The Commission remains unclear on this issue.
11:16I didn't say that any messages were deleted.
11:19What I did say were that, as in any access to documents request,
11:24what we first do is to check, are there any registered documents
11:28that fall within the scope of the request?
11:30We did that, didn't find any.
11:32The Commission considers that the judgment does not call into question
11:35the procedures for registering documents,
11:37but rather a lack of explanation.
11:39It interprets the court decision as an indication
11:41that it will have to justify itself better in the future.