Why young men are drawn to the far right and young women to the far left
Gender now splits the youngest voters more than class or education. Many young men feel sidelined by a shifting balance and vote far-right while young women vote far-left.
EU politics
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AI chatbots turn users’ most intimate data into a potential goldmine for advertisers, researchers warn
Researchers found that even when users rejected non-essential cookies, Perplexity, DeepSeek, Gemini, Copilot, ChatGPT and Claude still connected to Google Ads.
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[Interview] Ceuta crisis shows how EU border outsourcing puts children at risk, says German lawyer
By outsourcing border control to Morocco, Turkey or Albania and then panicking when they “open the gates,” German lawyer Lena Riemer says EU capitals have handed hostile regimes a cheap, reliable way to divide and humiliate Europe.
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[Interview] 70% of Montenegro supports EU membership – so will it happen in 2028? We ask lead MEP Marjan Šarec
EUobserver spoke to Marjan Šarec, former Slovenian prime minister, MEP for Renew Europe, and the parliament’s rapporteur for Montenegro. He’s keeping his optimism for the country’s accession.
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Divided EU cyber defence faces real-life Russian and Chinese threats
From phishing attacks on Polish soldiers to near-blackouts in winter, the EU’s fragmented cyber defence is seeing Russian online threats spill into real‑world dangers for ordinary Europeans.
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Former MEP Rachida Dati’s 2014 emails derided corruption allegations, which now form core of French trial
Former French MEP and culture minister Rachida Dati, who is now a Paris mayor, threatened to sue EUobserver in 2014 emails about corruption allegations, which are now coming home to roost in high-profile French trails.
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MEPs vote for €47bn in new Erasmus+ funds, as frugal states seek cuts to EU budget
With 24 votes in favour and one abstention, MEPs proposed to increase the European Commission’s original proposal from €40bn to €47bn on Tuesday.
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EU’s centre-right EPP seeks asylum opt-outs, as commission silent on new crisis rules
Political pressure for allowing EU asylum opt-outs continues to increase, as commission drafts vague new emergency rules in the wake of this summer’s Ceuta episode.
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EU reduces funds for women’s rights groups, in wider budget bonfire of good causes
As the EU seeks budget cuts to break a stalemate in member states’ talks, women’s rights groups are on the chopping bloc, prompting advocates’ concern that important causes are fading from the common agenda.
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Protesters in Brussels press EU on ‘broken promises’ over caged animals
Animal rights activists call for the commission to finally table cage ban proposals after years of delays, while Irish Ferries has 15 days to respond to a new complaint about transporting calves without giving them food.
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THIS WEEK: Interior ministers discuss Fortress Europe, as Kallas goes to SyriaInterior ministers will discuss how to secure borders and deport more immigrants in the wake of the Ceuta episode, while foreign affairs chief Kaja Kallas takes EU diplomacy to Syria.
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Deadlock on EU pesticides bill after scientists call for pause
Amid pushback from the European scientific community and countries outside the bloc, EU officials are under pressure to suspend negotiations on a Food and Feed law.
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EU data chief adds voice to unions’ fears of ‘carte blanche’ use of workers’ data for AI
EU data protection chief Wojciech Wiewiórowski has joined trade unions and privacy activists in their concerns over the ‘digital omnibus’, which includes amendments to EU privacy rules that would allow data harvesting from workers without their permission to feed AI models.
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Unions rally against new ‘EU Inc’ race-to-bottom on labour laws and pay
‘EU Inc’, or the 28th regime, started as an EU project to facilitate the expansion of small companies. Now, trade unions warn it could erode years of hard-earned labour rights.
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Dutch fossil-fuel exit plan shows EU struggle to set binding deadlines
The Dutch fossil fuel phase-out plan falls short of outlining clear deadlines, as EU countries struggle to fulfil the 2050 climate neutrality goal.
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German minister slams Costa over EU budget, says he has ‘completely lost touch with reality’
Time is running out for member states to move closer together on the next seven-year budget, with EU leaders aiming to strike a deal by the end of the year. But efforts by European Council president António Costa to bring capitals together in recent weeks have so far yielded little result.
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Poland’s pushback drive and EU asylum ‘emergency’ plan put rights ‘on a cliff edge’, warns Europe’s top rights chief
Poland is taking credit for a new so-called European emergency response framework, announced last week by the European Commission president. Details are scant but Poland is seeking to loosen UN rules on pushbacks, citing article 33(2) of the 1951 Refugee Convention.
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Auditors find EU cyber‑attack response is weakened by overlapping systems and secretive member states
Europe spent billions building a common cybersecurity defence. Yet a new audit has found that when a major cyber incident strikes, the EU’s response is not united.
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Irish regulator hits Google with €403m GDPR fine over invasive location tracking
The consumer-rights group which filed complaints against the tech giant lashed out at the “disproportionate” time taken for the Irish privacy watchdog to protect sensitive location data.
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THIS WEEK: Next budget and protectionist industrial policy on EU agenda as EPP chief visits CeutaAs EU ministers clash over how protectionist Europe’s new industrial push should be, EPP chief Manfred Weber is flying to Spain’s north African enclave. Meanwhile, Trump’s wars, tariffs and tensions with allies are also set to dominate the UN General Assembly, with Ukraine, Gaza and Iran high on the agenda.