European Union News - July 2010

The Council adopted on 26 July the decision establishing the European External Action Service (EEAS) and setting out its organisation and functioning. The Council therefore sets up EEAS as a functionally autonomous body of the Union under the authority of the High Representative as provided by the Treaty of Lisbon.

The European Union has published in the EU Official Journal of 24 July 2010 a notice addressed to intermediaries aiming to provide micro-credits or guarantees supporting micro-credits, about the implementation of the Guarantee Action under the European Progress Microfinance Facility. Among the 100 M€ channelled through Progress Facility, 25 M€ will be allocated to this Action Guarantee.

The Committee of European Banking Supervisors (CEBS), the European Central Bank (ECB) and the European Commission welcomed on 23 July the publication of the results of the EU-wide stress-testing exercise,  which was prepared and conducted by the CEBS and national supervisory authorities, in close cooperation with the ECB. Institutions were particularly supportive with the transparency under which the exercise was conducted, given the specific market circumstances under which banks currently operate.

The European Commission has extended until 31 December 2010 the Spanish recapitalisation measures in favour of the banking sector and the Portuguese bank guarantee and bank recapitalisation schemes.

Further to the launch of LIFE+ 2009 Call on May 2009, the European Commission has approved funding for 210 new projects. These projects, which represent a total investment 515 M€ of which the EU will provide 249.8 M€, will cover actions in the three fields targeted by the Call.

The Belgian Presidency of the EU Council has welcomed the extension of the 2008 Memorandum of Understanding on Co-operation between the Financial Supervisory Authorities, Central Banks and Finance Ministries of the European Union on cross-border financial stability to the authorities of the non-EU EEA countries Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway.

The Official Journal of the European Union publishes in its issue on 23 July, the Council Recommendation of 13 July 2010 on broad guidelines for the economic policies of the Member States and of the Union. With these guidelines Council follows Lisbon Treaty mandate for the adoption of both employment guidelines as well as broad economic policy guidelines to guide Member States’ policies.

Commission has published Annual Report on EU Customs actions to enforce intellectual property rights. In 2009, EU Customs took action in 43,500 cases involving several million products suspected of being counterfeited or pirated at the external borders of the EU, according to this report.

€1.85 million of EU funding helped the researchers to explore how dozens of databases from different organisations can be linked via peer-to-peer technology to improve response time and avoid duplication of efforts in cases of emergency.

The Official Journal of the European Union published on 22 July 2010, Council Directive 2010/45/EU of 13 July 2010 amending Directive 2006/112/EC on the common system of value added tax as regards the rules on invoicing. These new rules will enter into force on the 20th day following its publication and Member states will have to adopt the due provisions to comply with it by 31 December 2012.

In order to support the testing phase for the reference framework for sustainable cities, the Commission intends to contract technical assistance to organize the services and procedures in this phase, which will involve between 50 and 70 selected cities. Interested parties may submit their proposals to the Commission until September 15.

The European Commission has published in the Official Journal its Recommendation of 13 July 2010 on guidelines for the development of national co-existence measures to avoid the unintended presence of GMOs in conventional and organic crops. The objective of co-existence measures is to prevent the potential economic loss and impact of the admixture of GM and non-GM crops (including organic crops).